IBM becomed a partner with company Tokyo Ohka Kogyo (TOK). IBM wants to develop cheaper and more efficient solar power technologies based on CIGS ( copper-indium-gallium-selenide ). Those cells should be more than 15% efficient. This is much more efficient than usual 6% to 12% efficiency that current (CIGS) solar cells have achieved.

Classic photovoltaic solar cells convert usually 20% of sunlignt into electricity. Which is more than CIGS can do right now, but the cost of CIGS should be much less than the silicon based cells. Also the silicon cells are much more thicker than CIGS cells so the thin-film applications are more adapted for different use.

Announcing the partnership, an IBM spokesman Supratik Guha said, “I think that if we can get to a module cost of less than $1 per watt, and be able to keep a handle on the system costs, then one should be able to get to grid parity…We strongly feel that we have a shot.”

Source: EcoGeek

You Should Also Check Out This Post:

• Acciona's solar plant in Portugal
• New solar facility in Iran with parabolic mirrors
• Happy new Year 2009
• Top ten of Green Technology Blogs
• New solar charger from Energizer

More Active Posts:

• Guy Negre's Air Car coming to America by 2009-2010 (7)
• Solar panel - water heating for the masses (5)
• Electric car under 2500$ !! (4)
• Solar charger for your iPhone 3G (4)
• French Compressed Air Car soon in production ? (3)
• Screen-printed Solar Cells In Many different colors and designs. (3)
• Air conditioning powered by solar energy (3)
• CIGS which are 17.7 percent effficient (3)
• Cheep hydrogen fuel cells on their way to the productions.... (3)
• Revolutionary technology of Concentrated solar panels (3)