Semi-transparent solar cells that could be added to windows to efficiently harvest energy from indoor light as well as the sun have been developed by an international team led by UCL researchers.
Do you think there is an appreciable amount of IR, near IR, UV light that it could be worth it? I’m out of date, are we good at harvesting near-ir in photovoltaics? I remember hearing or reading about some frequency upconversion material solutions but it’s been a while.
Another problem that comes to mind is the fact that you often want to reflect non-useful-to-vision light rather than absorb it (and heat up).
The indoor light sounds pretty silly, I agree.
Do you think there is an appreciable amount of IR, near IR, UV light that it could be worth it? I’m out of date, are we good at harvesting near-ir in photovoltaics? I remember hearing or reading about some frequency upconversion material solutions but it’s been a while.
Another problem that comes to mind is the fact that you often want to reflect non-useful-to-vision light rather than absorb it (and heat up).