STANFORD, Ca, – Stanford University engineers have invested a solar panel that generates electricity at night.
Led by engineer Sid Assaworrarit an ordinary solar panel outfitted with a thermoelectric generator was used to generate a small amount of electricity from the slight difference in temperature between the ambient air and the surface of a solar panel pointed deep into space. The new technology takes advantage of a surprising fact about solar panels.
“During the day, there’s a light coming in from the Sun and hitting the solar cell, but during the night, something of a reverse happens,” Assawaworrarit says.
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That’s because solar panels — like everything warmer than absolute zero — emit infrared radiation.
“There’s actually light going out [from the solar panel], and we use that to generate electricity at night. The photons going out into the night sky actually cool down the solar cell,” he says.
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