What is Digg?137 Comments
- Tophillious, on 10/05/2008, -1/+91I always hear these new and innovative ideas on the front page of digg, and then never see them again.
- brad3378, on 10/05/2008, -0/+51Not only brilliant, but of course she's totally hot too.......
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8eNeReo-hw - inactive, on 10/05/2008, -1/+52also, we apparently cure cancer twice a month.
- DifferentAngle, on 10/05/2008, -1/+36"Firstly, she takes a standard silicon solar cell and..."
....isnt that cheating? - Lucifugerising, on 10/05/2008, -0/+31I make my pizza the old fashioned way.
Some old ass Italian man with a receding hairline does it with the help of his two sons. - jotate, on 10/05/2008, -0/+25I'd kill for science articles that have actual scientific information. Talk about the material layers or something, ffs. Stop telling me how awesome it is and show me how awesome it is.
- o76923, on 10/05/2008, -0/+21Very nifty, but not exactly a recent story. It was on the news cycle a few months ago. We just don't want Solar or something...
- TBombadil, on 10/05/2008, -2/+22but does it taste like pizza?
- aznpwnzor, on 10/05/2008, -0/+19just say what you want to do don't mince words
- Narcism, on 10/05/2008, -5/+24I'd put my penis in her vagina, if you know what I'm sayin'.
- caracter2, on 10/05/2008, -2/+20I'm still very excited cause she was my lecturer!!
- TVarmy, on 10/05/2008, -0/+15I think it's because some have more problems than the article lets on, and some need years of testing to prove their reliability/safety/feasibility.
- 1randomnumber, on 10/06/2008, -0/+12The reason it hasn't revolutionized anything yet is because the efficiency of the super cheap cells are crap. *maybe* 10% if you're lucky, but from the cells I've played around with, the printable types and the organic dye types usually have a 5% efficiency rating, if not less. Yeah, they will create electricity. However, the sheer space required to make them of any use is usually not available.
Say you wanted to run a hair dryer. Or a microwave. On average, either one of those use about 1000 watts. In full sunlight, with the sun directly overhead, you'll get about 1000 watts of usable energy hitting the ground for every square meter. At 5% efficiency, you'd need 20 m^2 of those cells to run a microwave. Keep in mind that this is also at peak power for the day, so if you wanted to run your microwave at some time other than noon, you'd need more than that 20 m^2, probably closer to 40 m^2 of area to have a reliable source during most of the day.
Battery storage is also a major problem, since if you can't store the power you're producing, you can't use it later. Lead-acids are cheap, but have bad power density, so you again need a large area to store the batteries, and lithium-ions/lithium polymer cells have great power density, but they are either incredibly expensive, highly volatile, or both.
I've been working with solar for the past 7 years, mainly in vehicle design, and for solar to actually take hold, efficiency of cells needs to go up, and those efficient cells (above 30%) need to be dirt cheap. It's great we can get non-efficient cells down to $1/watt, however, keep in mind that most arrays need replacing every 10-20 years, moreso with highly fragile space-grade arrays. The car I'm working on now, we've been wanting to buy 6 m^2 of "production rejects" space grade cells, and that will still cost close to $100,000. That would give us approximately 1500 watts of power at peak conditions. It's hard to get people to get on board when you'd need $100,000 to power your air conditioner during the day. - inactive, on 10/05/2008, -0/+11Free energy? Who'd want that! haha
- Areku, on 10/05/2008, -0/+11No, it'll work in Chicago, too.
- diizy, on 10/05/2008, -0/+10Sorry, I don't actually.
- Naomarik, on 10/05/2008, -0/+10This is what happens when technology and pizza mixes:
"BETTER PIZZA... BETTER PIZZA"
"GETTING A BETTER CRUUUUUST"
(skip to 4:19)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-St_ltH90Oc - JeffH, on 10/05/2008, -0/+10This is the third article in the past two years that I have seen that claims to have a miracle way to manufacture solar tech on the cheap. They all promise to revolutionize the way they are made and make them exponentially cheaper for the consumer, yet that hasn't happened yet. Why?
- toddkay, on 10/05/2008, -1/+9So she makes something by taking something and printing something on it, then baking it in something which then creates something that will revolutionize the way something is manufactured.
Worst science article ever. All we know for sure is that she is 23 and bakes something at around 550 degrees fahrenheit - Intercon, on 10/05/2008, -0/+8Meowskers! Double Hubba!
- seventhc, on 10/05/2008, -2/+10Easy to make as pizza? Does this mean it will only work in New York?
- TVarmy, on 10/05/2008, -0/+8It's near impossible to get it better. Anyone who doubts that hasn't had real pizza and deserves a publicly funded airline or train ticket to the Northeast.
- jsmithers, on 10/05/2008, -0/+8HANG ON A MINUTE....
Article says "using nothing more than some nail polish remover, a pizza oven and a standard inkjet printer."
Then article says "Firstly, she takes a standard silicon solar cell"
So, she's making a solar cell using an existing solar cell...? Where's the revolution/advantages?
Sorry for being thick, but what am I missing here? - teamgwho, on 10/05/2008, -0/+8Ray's Pizza & Power Company
- SylphA, on 10/05/2008, -2/+10Umm, since when were pizza ovens cheap, and pizzas easy to make?
- gaoshan, on 10/06/2008, -0/+7Actually it sounds like all of the 379 other "solar done cheap and easy" stories that have come out in the past year. Theoretically, awesome. Just like all the others. Do you wonder why you never hear about these making it to market in any meaningful way? It's because the realities of scaling and manufacturing are much more complicated than most realize. Trust me, if it was this cheap and easy people would be falling all over themselves to fund it. They aren't. For a reason.
- ripple123, on 10/05/2008, -0/+7WINK WINK
- hit9ent, on 10/05/2008, -2/+9If our lives were not controlled by corporate heads then these innovations and amazing technologies that bright ppl invent would seriously help our world so much. Its all about profit to them and i'm sick of it!
watch the new Zeitgeist Movie and it will explain in detail.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7065205277 ... - AgmLauncher, on 10/05/2008, -0/+7"Firstly, she takes a standard silicon solar cell"
Errm, if she has to take an already existing standard silicon solar cell, how is this cheap? - Grummond, on 10/05/2008, -0/+6No no no, we should colonize the sun, imagine the output of the solar cells!
We could use the power from it to power our personal air conditioners, keeping us cold and comfy.
Too much?
Darn. - renegadeafk, on 10/05/2008, -0/+6lmao
- DDION, on 10/05/2008, -0/+5I hear Dyson spheres burn oil...
- Areku, on 10/05/2008, -0/+5This
- blacklilyninja, on 10/05/2008, -0/+5it was used as a template.
- Skor459, on 10/05/2008, -0/+5How cheap is it if it's just cheap stuff put on top of an expensive silicon solar cell?
- inactive, on 10/05/2008, -1/+6it could revolutionize access to solar technology in the developing world.
----
If the technology were any good, it's usefulness would not be limited to the developing world.
Buried as junk science. - sClubDevin, on 10/05/2008, -1/+6Will i want to die when i have too much of it, like with pizza?
- inactive, on 10/05/2008, -0/+5Not a new idea, but I think this is a different developer. The story you're thinking of was also on the front-page of Digg in March...it was about a Massachusetts company called Konarka Technologies that revealed it had come up with a similar inkjet-based, low-cost fabrication process:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/earth/4253 ... - Phalanxia, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4How efficient is it? I it's any less then 5%, then it's useless except for domestic use.
Thing is, get solar panels that are 20% efficient, cover an area the size of Texas with them, and the worlds energy problems are solved. - stealthc, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4Well, as long as we're already flouting the constitution to the tune of 55 trillion dollars, why the heck not?
- tocsy, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4Compared to making solar cells, they are.
The A-300, the most efficient silicon solar cell out there, costs about 25 bucks per cell. - CatsAreGods, on 10/05/2008, -3/+7Because some oil company arms-length subsidiary buys up all the rights and puts it in the vault with the Pogue carburetor.
- inactive, on 10/05/2008, -1/+5Mmmmmmmmmm. Pizza.
- Orderlyschism, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4It's in the interest of the people in power to rely on the current energy and fuel sources that are in place. The people in power aren't at all concerned with using better and more efficient technology.
They already are controlling the markets, and don't like to see their mountains of profits change. Big business will never support cheap renewable PRIVATE energy sources. - Influencer, on 10/05/2008, -1/+5This sounds too good to be true.
- aznpwnzor, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4great where do i fill out the form for the money?
- fwertz, on 10/05/2008, -3/+7Or it's a government ploy to hide all of our progress to keep dipping hands into our donations to solve similar problems in similar fields!
- inactive, on 10/06/2008, -1/+5Anyone else sick of how all these new technologies are always referenced at the end with "this could revolutionize ____ in the developing world"? Hell, there's plenty of Americans who don't have solar panels yet. Why do they always emphasize the developing world as if they should be the first to get free/inexpensive access to new technology? They still haven't solved their own overpopulation/starvation problem.
- blackdeath88012, on 10/05/2008, -0/+4she is hot. DUGG
- EtherGnat, on 10/05/2008, -0/+3"There is currently no method for recycling solar panels...."
"Recycling of solar panels should stay pretty low for a while, though. Solar cells have a useful life of many decades if nothing out of the ordinary happens to them, and so far most recycled panels have been flawed or damaged modules.
But these numbers are bound to trend up. About 16,000 tonnes are expected to be sent back in Europe by 2015, compared to 2,000 tonnes last year.
Turning Old Solar Panels into New Solar Panels?
The cost of making a solar panel from a recycled one is about the same as from new materials, but on the energy side, it only takes about 1/3 of the energy. We can also expect that as recycling volume goes up, a cost advantage will develop." http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/05/solar-pane ... -
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