Ghod this is inane: ABC news article on plastic solar cells.

[skids]

Here's a perfect example of how our media fails us. First let's start with the dumbest rhetorical question we can come up with for a headline:

"Could Plastic Help Produce Cheaper Solar Power?"

F**kin duh yeah! Plastic only makes just about everything cheaper used in one role or the other. So here I was thinking that maybe this was an article about the guy who recently pointed out (again, no duh) that plastic aluminum mylar through and concentrator systems were loads cheaper than glass or polished metal mirror system. Or maybe UV hardened polycarbonate fresnel lenses. But no, it's about plastic solar cells.

Either this science beat reporter just stumbled out of a years-long groggy renewable energy hybernation to throw together 30 minutes of web browsing into a half assed article, or someone in one of the plastic solar companies or research groups decided to peddle influence and/or do a "news buy." More likely the latter. Either way, this is the crap they come up with for an introduction to the news:

In hopes of making solar energy more useful and affordable, several scientists have been working on creating organic photovoltaic cells that replace the usual silicon with readily available materials such as carbon or plastic.

If they succeed, designers could one day integrate solar cells into everyday gadgets like iPods and cellphones. Even the energy absorbed by window tinting could be used to power a laptop, for example.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/FutureTech/story?id=1199856&page=1

HELLO? May I please bring your attention to the fact that we've had like five ways to make silicon-less solar cells for years now and that they are already in mid-scale production and that mass-production line scale up is where the news is in this reguard.

And who cares about iPods? They use like no real amount of energy. Let's talk car hoods, roof shingles, and vinyl siding.

Oh yeah. And we've got the window-tint power cells too already. Where has this guy been living, at the bottom of an oil well?

"If they succeed." Indeed. Feh.

Now, after leaving us all with the impression that the end of the silicon bottleneck is many years away, instead like one or two, they get to the actual news -- the plastics folks have bumped up their efficiency a bit.

Well that's cool.

But if they wanted to actually tell people news, maybe a better approach might be a little original research. You now, like maybe a look at which technologies have how much manufacturing capacity online and planned? And where that is located, along with the associated jobs? You know, something to give some meat to the story, instead of being yet another (yawn) "eggheads make a gizmo in a lab somewhere far, far, away from the closest factory" book report on a engineering journal article or two.

Again: Feh.

[populistdriven]

1. thanks! you would make a great Lewis Black stand-in! :)

http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_daily_show/videos/lewis_black/index.jhtml

[Benhurst]

2. Instead of being so negative, skids, why don't you introduce ABC's

science reporter to the magic of a Google search?

Jeez! Just because someone has a cushy job as an MSM reporter, doesn't mean he or she should have any training or credentials.

:hi:

[skids]

3. lol.

Yes, I should definitely volunteer my time as just one guy with common damn sense to provide a journalism lesson to an on-the-clock journalist.

:hi:

[ellenfl]

4. won't plastic degrade from heat and light? and is it not

still made from petroleum?

ellen fl

[skids]

5. No, and probably, not neccessarily, and it doesn't matter.

Noone markets a solar cell without a bare minimum of 15-year lifespan these days. (That's what kept organic dye cells off the market though now they have developed a "rechargable" organic dye cell where you just redeposition the dye every few years.)

As far as whether plastic comes from petroleum -- there are vegetable based plastics but usually yes it does. It'll probably use about as much plastic as a family of four uses to wrap their sandwiches in a month. When people stop using saran wrap, then maybe it's time to care about the petro content of durable goods.

[rainidame]

6. I am looking forward to the integration of . . .

solar cells and the relatively new sun tunnels that are currently replacing the skylight for improving natural light in the home. . . .
Have you ever seen these? AMAZING... One friend had a central bathroom, so dark and dank, . . . after they installed the sun tunnel, even at 7 pm in the fall, (not quite dark but definitely getting there with sunset at about 7:45) we keep getting up to go turn off the hallway lights, NOT the bathroom lights as they were never this bright. . .it is truly amazing. . . if a combo of the light intensification of these and solar collecting, wowoowowowowowowowow!

[skids]

7. Available by year-end, if testing goes well:

...but only for the commercial sector (flat top office buildings)



http://www.energyinnovations.com/sunflower250.html