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Cutting the CO2 from e-readers with solar
October 12, 2009 - by Emma Ritch, Cleantech Group
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South Korea-based LG Display (NYSE:LPL) unveiled yesterday a new e-reader device that uses a thin-film solar cell to recharge its batteries.
The 20-gram solar cell has an energy conversion efficiency of 9.6 percent, but the company aims to reach 12 percent by 2010 and 14 percent by 2012, at which point LG Display plans to commercialize the technology.
LG Display, which develops liquid crystal display (LCD) technology, says the lightweight, flexible solar cell also has applications in mobile phones.
The current efficiency level means it would take four to five hours in the sun to provide one day's worth of power for the e-reader, LG Display said.
A report released earlier this year from the Cleantech Group indicated that Amazon's Kindle e-reader has an approximate carbon footprint of 168 kilograms through its lifecycle, including manufacturing, disposal and energy use. Energy use was just a fraction of the overall footprint because the devices are equipped with ambient-light displays from E-Ink that draw power from the lithium-ion batteries only when images change.
The Cleantech Group concluded that the carbon footprint of an e-reader was equivalent to that of 23 physical books (see Cleantech Group report: E-readers a win for carbon emissions).
LG Display's thin-film solar cell is 10 centimeters in width and length, and 0.7 millimeters thick. The company said it fits on the 6-inch display panel of LG Display's e-book currently in mass production.
"The idea of e-book combined with solar cell will offer users the added benefit of longer usage," said Ki Yong Kim, head of the Solar Cell Office at LG Display, in a news release.
Copyright © 2009 Cleantech Group LLC. All rights reserved, including right of redistribution.
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Comments
Solar not the Greenest Option
Submitted on October 12th, 2009 by Ozzie Zehner (not verified)We have to consider if it is reasonable to spend escalating sums of cash to install solar technologies that are in the stone-age of their development when we could instead be investing that money into the very research and development activities that could some day make them a viable solution for a broader populace.
Current solar cell technologies necessitate large up-front investments and vast quantities of mined minerals for their manufacture. Not only are solar cells a terribly expensive way to reduce CO2 emissions, but their manufacturing process is one of the largest emitters of hexafluroethane (C2F6), nitrogen trifluoride (NF3), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) – three gruesome greenhouse gasses that make CO2 seem harmless. Furthermore, solar cells are difficult to install, require regular cleanings and rely on a thinly-spread solar radiation from a sun that only shines half of the day, a cosmological constant showing no signs of improving.
For solar-based energy to make an impact, we will have to shift funding away from fabrication of devices such as e-readers and toward research and development, implement passive solar techniques on a much larger scale, update building codes, and plant trees (the ultimate solar mechanism).
Ozzie Zehner
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