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Burning out of consumption looks at your phone, and you realize that the battery is running low, which means you have to travel long distances to the city to pay for the device. When you get home, the sky is already dark. You light the kerosene lamp and cast a dim light in the room. Most of your income will be burned off by lights and emit toxic gases. Breathing the same air as a burning light can be equivalent to taking a few packs of cigarettes a day.
(Solar cells provide clean energy, but the efficiency of fixed solar systems is limited)
One-third of the promotion
For most people living in the United States, this situation seems strange, but for many people living in developing countries, this is a universal reality. One possible solution is to use solar energy isothermal energy to generate electricity for on-site lighting and charging.
During the March 20th meeting of the American Physical Society in Boston this week, Beth Park will showcase a design created by her team that increases the amount of sunlight captured by solar cells and increases its energy production by nearly a third.
“In Uganda, 20% to 25% of people don’t have access to electricity,” said Parks, an associate professor at Colgate University. “A solar cell provides enough energy to power the light and charge the phone and radio. This is a huge improvement in quality of life.”
Design principle
While solar panels provide a clean source of renewable energy, they are typically mounted on a fixed frame and are only optimally oriented towards the sun during certain times of the day.
Parks has seen a frame design that allows solar panels to use the suspended heavy objects to track the sun. However, the design has not been tested and it is not possible to determine its actual implementation. It is also not optimized to ensure commercial viability and affordability.
During the year of the Fulbright Scholarship in Uganda, she collaborated with students at Mbarara University of Technology to use a metal tube design framework that local welders can easily obtain and assemble.
“We made a frame with cheap materials that allowed solar panels to track the sun arc all day,” says Parkes. “This approach can make solar energy more affordable for families and small businesses in the developing world.”
In her design, a bucket of stone is placed on the west side of the frame and a bucket of water is placed on the east side. Using controlled leaks from the bucket, the weight moves and the panel slowly rotates from east to west throughout the day.
The possibility of small industries
Parks and her team randomly tested 20 designs in Uganda. The solar cells on the movable frame are 30% more sunlight captured by the fixed solar cells in the same location.
“If this framework is adopted, it could create a small industry for the local community,” Parks said. According to Parks, the cost of the system - solar cells, batteries, chargers and frames - is about 10% lower than similar rooftop solar cell systems. This surprisingly simple, inexpensive and ingenious approach can increase the amount of solar energy that people in developing countries and those in remote areas that deviate from the region.
