Until energy from the sun can beat energy from coal at the marketplace, solar will remain a niche player, adorning the rooftops of those who care more for their green reputation than for their bottom lines. Enter Nanosolar, a San Jose-based start-up that manufactures thin-film solar panels. Unlike the bulky silicon panels that dominate the solar market, Nanosolar thin-film technology is light and extremely cheap to make. The key is the manufacturing process: while silicon panels need to be baked in batches, Nanosolar's thin-film panels roll off the assembly line, as if from a printing press.
In their solar cell technology, they use an active material called CIGS, a Copper based semiconductor. How does this stack up against enriched Uranium?
1kg CIGS = 5kg Uranium
Here’s a noteworthy fact, pointed by one of their engineers: It turns out that 1kg of CIGS, embedded in a solar cell, produces 5 times as much electricity as 1kg of enriched Uranium, embedded in a nuclear power plant.
Or said differently, 1kg of CIGS is equivalent to 5kg of enriched Uranium in terms of the energy the materials deliver in solar and nuclear respectively.
The Uranium is burned and then stored in a nuclear waste facility; the CIGS material produces power for at least the warranty period of the solar cell product after which it can then be recycled and reused an indefinite number of times.