[Components]
TDK Corporation - Dye-sensitized solar cell

Although solar panels curb power consumption, producing them consumes energy. They are semiconductors, after all, and it takes about four years of clean power to eliminate the carbon generated from making the panel.

TDK’s solar dye is different. It is a thin film material that can be spread onto a substrate at fairly low temperatures. The dye has been shown to be close to 8 percent efficient. While that is low compared to crystalline silicon solar panels, it competes with some other experimental thin film technologies. If TDK can conquer some of the many problems that other manufacturers have experienced with solar dye, this product could do quite well.

The company also demonstrated that solar panels don’t need to be utilitarian devices. Rather than connecting the active solar material with a rigid grid of wires, it created designs with its wires. Potentially, this could make portable solar technologies more attractive and palatable to consumers.

The 32 Watt TV. Although light emitting diodes (LEDs) consume less energy than fluorescent bulbs, the engineering that’s gone into fluorescents over the past several years give fluorescents an advantage in certain situations.

Michael Kanellos