The rumors of the electric car's death have been highly exaggerated.Not only is the electric car on the road, mostly in the form of a hybrid vehicle, but the solar power car is also on the boards. Solar power cars have been around for a while, usually in university competitions, but they had to have incredibly large solar panels in order to power a tiny race car. Now, the solar power car battery seems to be just around the corner~Now, the solar power car battery seems to be just around the corner}.
Honda's Plans
You may think that one of the companies making the most money off of gas-powered cars would not welcome the electric car, but Honda is striving to make a more and more efficient solar power car battery. Not only are they limiting their market to automobiles, but also to all of the uses that solar power can be put to.
Honda isn’t the only company that's investing heavily on improving the efficiency of the solar cell.hey opened a manufacturing plant in 2007 to the tune of $86.5 million (US). Its sole purpose is to make solar cells to power buildings and vehicles. They mean to make everything from solar power car batteries to solar power battery packs.
New Material
The key to being able to get solar power moving has been the realization that not only silicon could be used to make a working solar panel. Silicon has the ability to make energy molecules hang on and acts as a sort of bus in order to transfer these molecules to other places. They make great conductors. However, you needed a huge silicon panel to get enough silicon to make something like a solar power car battery.
Now, Honda has another material that also acts as a conductor of solar power into electricity.Instead of silicon, Honda's solar cells are made of ultra-thin membrane of copper, indium, gallium and deselenium. The material is often called CIGS.Get used to hearing that anocrym. In a few years, when you hear the media talking about CIGS, they don’t mean the tobacco kind.
When Can I Get It?
There are already tiny solar powered cars that run on a solar power car battery that you can buy and put together. These "kit cars" are street legal and are usually only two-seaters. They usually can only go about thirty miles an hour. However, the world’s smallest solar power car that world perfectly is only less than an inch long.
