Discussion on:

Breakthrough: World's most efficient solar panel

So, what is the differential in cost (optics for concentration) of this installation vs. cells which use unconcentrated light?

exactly right. Is the cost of these the same as a regular panel? how much more?

Your comment is spot-on. Let's not forget that Solyndra used technology that concentrated sunlight. Maybe these things have a future, but that will have to be demonstrated.

1) The cells do not concentrate sunlight, the modules do that, but not explained here.
2) Solyndra cells not only did not concentrate sunlight, but half of the cylindrical cell faced away from the sun
3) What was the point, again?

Just lab numbers, which may mean nothing when applied to providing power.

QUESTIONS.... Over a long period what is the efficiency of these panels? What is the cost per kwhr? What is the projected life span of these panels? Is there the possibility of a return on investment on these panels without government subsidies or tax credits? Because the taxpayers of this country are getting sick of these under the table payoff's to Obama constituents.

A couple of hundred million dollar investment in renewable solar energy is a whole lot better and smarter than the 3 or four $TRILLION, along with the 4,500 American lives that bush flushed down the toilet as payoffs to Halliburton and the rest of his have more constituency.

We have solar panels all over the place in California. I guess they're working, since people aren't putting them up because they look pretty.

Unhh.. and Calif is sweating now BECAUSE their few nuclear plants are down for a maintenance fix... Where's their miniscule solar contribution gotten them?

The USA was once in the forefront of nuclear physics. The proof lies in part in these names: americium, californium, berkelium, lawrencium, seaborgium. Einstein was a citizen too, but I won't claim einsteinium for the USA.
We liberals should be proud of this, in spite of the bombing of Nagasaki (there is a grain of an excuse for Hiro-shima, so long as you don't call the place Hi ROSH ima). But more to the point, the reason there's a problem when a few nuke plants are off line is that they quietly and with astonishingly little pollution deliver twice as much electricity as the only really productive and reliable solar-origin technology, the big, mostly government owned hydroelectric plants.
The USA has a tested design for a meltdown-proof, terrorist-proof, renewable and sustainable nuclear breeder reactor that needs so little fuel to produce a gigawatt.year of electricity that if it were government owned, it could probably pay off the national debt by charging $0.08 per kWh. Our present reactors, by EIA data, run at 90% of 24/7, higher than any other technology.

THE NEW SOLAR PANELS YIELD 240 WATTS EACH. THEY ARE LOCALLY MANUFACTURED IN GEORGIA USA! THE COST PER WATT HAS COME DOWN TO A REASONABLE $2.50 AND INSTALLED COST OF ABOUT $5.00 PER WATT. THE ROI WITHOUT ANY TAX CREDIT HAS FALLEN TO ALMOST 9 YEARS FOR AN AVERAGE HOME. IF YOU ARE NOT AWARE OF THIS FACT, GET OUT AND LEARN. THEY HAVE A GREAT GATHERING OF SEIA IN ORLANDO STARTING SEPT 11, 2012 TO SEPT 13, 2012. IF YOU ATTEND THE SEMINARS, YOU WILL GET TO LEARN THE FACTS.

$1 per watt installed is the real number, until it's there it is just another rip off and BS marketing play.

I could not have said it better ....good one
You can't replaced 4,500 lives
Look like some people have a short memory

AMEN. I WONDER HOW THAT GUY SLEEPS AT NIGHT KNOWING HE WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATH OF SO MANY INNOCENT LIVES?

As Justin Gerdes writes in the 5-24-12 issue of Forbes, Bloomberg New Energy Finance reports that:

"According to BNEF, the levelized cost of electricity (the cost distributed over a projects lifetime) for conventional silicon PV declined by nearly 50% from an average of $0.32/kWh in early 2009 to $0.17/kWh in early 2012; thin-film PV dropped from $0.23/kWh to $0.16/kWh over the same period. As of the first quarter of 2012, BNEF pegs the levelized cost range at $0.11/kWh to $0.25/kWh. Residential customers in the United States pay an average retail price for electricity of $0.115 cents/kWh."

The reason coal and petroleum remain in the conversation as "cosseted fossil-fuel incumbents" (Gerdes) is that vested corporate welfare interests keep taking $40 Billion annually from taxpayers and shoveling it into the front doors of fossil fuel miners.

Actually, I think around 50 MW of CPV systems have been installed. The cost of electicity that they produce is about 20% lower than for either thin film or planar silicon in sunny locations. In the future, they will produce solar electricty at under 10 cents per kWh. If you wish more information, there are 6 chapters on CPV in the 2010 Wiley book entitled "Solar Cells and Their Applications, 2nd Edition". The reason for the lower cost is simply that glass for lenses is cheaper than single crystal Si, the module efficiency are 3 times higher than for thin films, and tracking produces more kWh per kW. Finally, there is less field labor for arrays that are 2 to 3 times smaller for the same kW or MW rating.

CPV has the added advantage of being able to create electricity 24/7 so long as a sufficient amount of heat can be maintained. You can turn on your lamp at night.
We need to start thinking in terms of "closer to point of use" being better than long distances from creation to use.

Need I say more? Except for a few days in the polar zones, how do you get sunlight 24/7?

Yea. This is the future. I'm currently working on a tracking system for these types of CPV panels. I plan to have it ready sometime next year.

These kinds of panels may get electricity to the grid with an overall system efficiency of 20 to 25 percent.

CPV equipment is somewhat more expensive as an upfront capital cost ($/W), but it's higher efficiency means it will produce more energy over the entire lifetime, so it's levelized cost of energy (LCOE) is competitive or better than traditional thin film or silicon panels. The LCOE will depend on the strength of the solar resource at the site, so sunniest locations (California and SW states) are starting to see grid parity for solar technologies, both standard and CPV.

Since CPV is less mature, it is expected to have better % improvement in efficiency and %decrease in cost over the next 10 years, leading to knock-out combination.

This 2008 paper has good explanation and some values
http://www.slideshare.net/warlor/levelized-cost-of-electricity-for-cpv-paper-nishikawa

we need use all advanced technologies. Alternative energy or "green" energy is a good choice for all countries to save resources and reduce the cost. Solar power is just one of alternative power,we can also use the wind or the water. russiske damer

http://www.care2.com/causes/how-to-make-solar-energy-better-use-spinach.html

the more efficient the better. I woul dlike to have those panels on my own house
http://www.handymandy.dk/solcelleanlaeg-fra-solaredge/

see above url

I am not terribly well informed about current PV Cells, but surely any improvement in efficiency is welcome. The distribution of energy over thousands of square kilometers must be very inefficient with significant losses - the more that solar can compete with conventional power generation, the better ... even community arrays reducing the distance would be better than the current situation. It's that establishment cost which is prohibitive, but when you spread it over the life of the product, and take into account the other advantages, it has to be worth pursuing.