Israeli solar technology to compete with oil

We continue our country series with another look at Israel. As we mentioned earlier the culture of innovation drives the county’s economy despite its location, lack of resources and plenty of hostile neighbors.  Some of the industries that developed in Israel more than others are getting a lot of attention these days - yes, I am talking green technologies and alternative energy supply.

 

Way before it became a buzz, the government of Israel started investing in the alternative sources of energy.  The country ranks among the highest in relation to the amount of sunny days it gets a year. Anyone who lived in Israel knows that majority of apartment buildings and individual houses get their hot water from the sun using rooftop solar panels. Solar energy has been a subject of research for many years and today Israel is at the frontier of major breakthroughs in this area. 

 

A direct result of such investment is ZenithSolar, an Israeli start-up specializing in highly efficient solar energy conversion into electricity and hot water heating. The original technology was developed by the group of scientists in Ben Gurion University and Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for which the company bought the rights some 3 years ago.  Now ZenithSolar is building a first commercial solar energy farm that will supply electricity and hot water to a residential community based its optical dish technology. 

 

The approach combines the use of traditional highly efficient solar cells with capturing the sun light reflected by a large number of small curved mirrors installed in a smart configuration on the dish hardware.  It allows for 75% conversion of the incoming sun light energy into electricity and heat output.  The efficiency is also achieved by utilizing the excess heat generated in the solar cell instead of removing it to avoid the damage to the cells in the conventional Concentrated Photovoltaic (CPV) systems.  And as in the Beatles song the dishes follow the sun throughout the day by keeping the best angle to achieve the greatest exposure. 

 

During the initial pilots this technology showed 5 times the efficiency of traditional solar cells and can come close to competing with oil and gas. According to the Israel’s National Infrastructure Ministry solar panels for water-heating already provide 4% of the country’s total energy demand. The figure could jump to more than 16% if such technology is widely available —a big boost for a country now almost totally dependent on imported energy. Israel made a strategic goal of achieving oil independence by 2020.

 

We will be talking more about alternative energy supplies in our future posts.

Comments: 0; Published: January 13, 2010; Permalink

Tags: green supply chain,green technologies,supply chain