MAREC tenant awarded patents for ultra-efficient solar power system

Sol Electrica LLC, an affiliate client at Grand Valley's MAREC business innovation center, has been issued two patents for a solar power system that can produce electricity for less than that charged by utilities, and about half the cost of traditional solar panels.

The system is the modular solar power plant, which is a novel means to collect solar energy and convert it into electricity. Based on a system of small, sun-tracking collecting dishes, the modular plants can be used for a single house or expanded to cover the needs of an industrial complex.

Current solar collector farms have major efficiency issues, such as radiated heat loss and can convert less than half of solar energy into heat, which is used to generate steam and electricity. Large solar farms also require large amounts of natural gas to keep the system hot at night, decreasing efficiencies even further. Sol Electrica's system does not need to be kept hot at night and converts almost all of the solar energy to heat, drastically increasing efficiency.

The new system patented by Sol Electrica is an alternative to photovoltaic solar panels, which generally have below 20 percent efficiency. The efficiencies of the modular solar power plants are expected to reach well over 30 percent. With a similar cost to solar panels, the plants will have a smaller footprint and achieve a positive return on investment in half the time.

For more information, http://www.sol-electrica.com/