A flexible solar cell that could provide cheap energy for everyone has been awarded a prize worth nearly a million dollars.
The Millennium Technology Prize, which recognises “technological innovation that is significantly improving the quality of human life”, was awarded to inventor Michael Grätzel in Switzerland last week.
Grätzel said his solar cells have many benefits and could, for example, soon be helping people in developing countries to connect to the Internet.
“I was in Tanzania last year and everyone has a mobile phone; but there’s no grid to charge them,” he said.
(READ more at SciDev.net)
Amazing! Bring it on! I followed the links from this post and explored it more deeply: love the image of the little solar cell on a pole on top of a grass hut 🙂 Bringing solar power to the world is only a year or so away, with the right people behind this fantastic idea! We have a cottage off the grid, and this will help diminish our use of the fuel consuming noisy generator, without spending $5,000-$15,000 to get full solared-up.