Off-grid domestic solar systems have tended to follow linear thinking. The earliest were UPS batteries connected to the household grid. Then someone hit on the idea of joining them to solar panels. These enabled homes to ‘island’ in daytime on sunny days, and have a few light bulbs glowing in the dark at night. However, we were still far from having batteries in the heart of systems. They were troublesome appendages because we had to store them somewhere.
The Fundamental Inefficiency of Solar Panels
Conventional photovoltaic panels are unintelligent devices. They wait for the sun to come to them like sunbathers on a California beach.
They are at their most efficient when the sun is directly overhead. At other times, they ‘sip’ the sun because they are unable to do anything else.
Let’s turn our attention to a field of sunflowers for a moment. We will get back to having batteries in the heart of off-grid solar systems in a moment.
Do you remember when you were still a small child, how you watched sunflowers following solar energy with their heads. Perhaps you imagined them storing it in their stalks.
Batteries in the Heart of Smartflower Sunflower
Start-up Smartflower has revealed what it considers ‘the world’s first intelligent energy plant’. It has petals that open like a sunflower in the sunshine. Then they faithfully follow the sun on its journey from horizon to horizon. This time, there are batteries in the heart of the device. They are in the thickened stem of the revolutionary battery charger.
The design, although undoubtedly expensive is an important step in getting solar power to batteries, so they can do their job of brightening our lives. Smartflower is sufficiently intelligent to fold away in heavy weather, and then shut down at night. When there is no sun to drink, it goes to bed. We see great potential for space exploration. So there will be batteries in the heart of our quest for life everywhere we go.
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Preview Image: Sunflowers
