Re:The price of solar power just fell 50% in 16 months
by coredog64 on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @03:08PM
(#11623342)
As an EMH guy, I'd like to think that if an Einstein–Szilard cooler was more economical than grid power for A/C and/or food refrigeration that there'd already be systems for sale.
Re:The price of solar power just fell 50% in 16 months
by kragen on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @03:43PM
(#11623604)
There are absorption refrigerators for sale for food refrigeration — I had one in my Volkswagen — but I don't think they use the Einstein-Szilard design, but a simpler one. Here's one: http://www.amazon.com/Norcold-Inc-Refrigerators-N841-Refrige...
A thing I haven't seen, but which ought to be practical, is a solar thermal fridge — for example, using the ammonia-absorption cycle that propane-powered fridges use, but heated with sunlight instead of flames. PV panels are typically 16% efficient, but it's easy for solar thermal collectors to reach 50% efficient, and they're also about five times cheaper per unit area (still). So you'd think it would make sense to power the fridge directly from sunlight.