This past summer was unusually hot and sunny.  The air conditioners ran nonstop throughout most of the country. One day at work, while I looked outside, it occurred to me that all the sunshine that was baking down on Zycon World was going to waste.  Air conditioners gobble up vast quantities of energy and they work hardest when the sun is shining its brightest. Why couldn’t the sun’s energy run all the air conditioners of the world?  After all they are most needed when the sun is most abundant.   

It took a few minutes of searching before I found an article that was a real eye opener.  In Australia, the land of endless sunshine, they too have been looking at this question.  It seems they have come up with a way of slicing up silicon solar cells and standing the strips on end to increase their working surfaces.  Their new process promises to drastically drop the price of solar cells. It is anticipated in their test studies that solar generated energy will be less costly than the other conventional sources currently in use. You just need sunshine, something that they have a lot of in the land down under.  It looks like it will work in other less sunny climates too. For full details please see the Australian National University Reporter at:

http://info.anu.edu.au/mac/Newsletters_and_Journals/ANU_Reporter/097PP_2006/_02PP_Autumn/_solar.asp