Comments on: Chicago’s Willis Tower to Become a Vertical Solar Farm

By: Kevin Pearson

Kevin Pearson — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 15:14:56 +0000

What a cool Idea if you could retrofit all buildings….. Well we have the product that will do that. at proactive energy concepts and it will change the way we power buildings. I love the idea of knocking down the glare on windows so all of you that don’t know the lie’s the window companies and tint companies have been telling you. Understand heat needs to be reduced not concentrated by inefficient window coverings. The 20 years of research we have on this issue tells me that were finally moving in the right direction. Kudos to these guys and what a great market to develop.

By: ahinalu

ahinalu — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 16:33:01 +0000

Every high-rise in the US should have these on every sun facing side and a wind farm on their roofs. People worry about me leaving my phone charger plugged in when I’m not charging my phone yet there’s so much wasted potential energy not being used and so much wasted energy being used to cool these buildings.

Two rocks one stone, that’s change I can believe in. LOL

By: electric38

electric38 — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 21:29:02 +0000

The interesting item is the heat block. I live in Nevada where just that aspect of it presents a significant cost factor. If energy is created, while blocking heat, much the better. If they incorporated LED’s in the interior lighting, a very low energy use should result, as they do not generate more heat (that AC must counteract).

By: craigjohnson

craigjohnson — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 08:46:13 +0000

Very interesting! @msrp—if that side of the building is so sunny, it’s likely that people had their shades closed during the day anyhow. But you’re right: BIPV doesn’t make any difference, really, if the overall energy use in the building isn’t taken into account, so I hope they’re doing a thorough audit of lighting anyway.

The article should make it clear that these windows don’t produce the same amount of power as a solar panel that’s the same size as the window, and they’re not converting indirect (diffuse) light. Pythagoras is probably trying to say that the PV elements within the windows are very efficient and do absorb the entire visible spectrum. Clearly some light gets through because of the optical design of the window, so this is light that’s not being absorbed. But standard definitions of efficiency are based on absorbance over an area. Per unit area they might indeed be more efficient than windows made with a thin active layer in between the glazing that’s transparent to some visible light, but they’re only as efficient as standard commercial solar panels for light that’s directly incident on the active area. To me this is an important distinction. To some it’s boring as hell.

Cheers!
Craig Johnson
UNSW, Sydney

By: msrp

msrp — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 13:58:04 +0000

The cynic in me wonders how many more lamps will be running because of the dimmer light.

But in all seriousness, it’s a really neat idea, and what a great location for a trial run. The 90-plus summer days and the lake-borne ice storms (sometimes in the same day…) will certainly put it through its paces.

By: poyntek

poyntek — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 13:48:25 +0000

Nice idea, I wonder if it will all be grid tied solar power, or if they will create some storage of solar power for emergency use in power outages? I made a much smaller solar backup system for my home office, that works great when I lose power. In fact, I used it last night when a storm knocked out the power. I still had lights, laptop, cell charger, FIOS connection and phone. It was cheap to make and pretty easy to setup. You can look at how I made it if you want…

http://www.tech-adventures.com/2011/03/stay-powered-on-tech-devices-keep.html