Solar Balloons can power remote areas and quickly provide emergency power in disasters. Joseph Cory, of Geotectura.com
, and Pini Gurfil, his research partner in the Haifa Technion, Haifa, Israel, are developing the balloons. Helium balloons floating above the trees or tethered to the roofs of buildings, can provide more power in less space and at lower cost than roof mounted or ground mounted systems. They can also be deployed very quickly in an emergency.
Where conventional PV Solar installations are two dimensional, these are three dimensional.
Initial research, using computer models and a prototype, shows that a 10 foot diameter PV Solar balloon provides the energy of a 269 square foot PV Solar surface. The cost of the balloon is targeted at $4000. The cost of a comparable surface mounted system is estimated to $10,000.
I read about this on Pinkus Javits’ SustainabiliTank blog, Gizmundo, and Israel 21C.
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