Thursday, October 24, 2013

AFP — Game changer? Chinese scientists create window that generates energy

Scientists in China said Thursday they had designed a “smart” window that can both save and generate energy, and may ultimately reduce heating and cooling costs for buildings....Gao’s team discovered that a material called vanadium oxide (VO2) can be used as a transparent coating to regulate infrared radiation from the Sun.
VO2 changes its properties based on temperature. Below a certain level it is insulating and lets through infrared light, while at another temperature it becomes reflective.
A window in which VO2 was used could regulate the amount of Sun energy entering a building, but also scatter light to solar cells the team had placed around their glass panels, where it was used to generate energy with which to light a lamp, for example.
“This smart window combines energy-saving and generation in one device, and offers potential to intelligently regulate and utilise solar radiation in an efficient manner,” the study authors wrote in the journal Nature Scientific Reports.
The Raw Story
Game changer? Chinese scientists create window that generates energy
Agence France-Presse

1 comment:

paul meli said...

So it's solar cells that generates the energy, not the window itself.

More news at 11.