Scientists Discover How to Turn Toxic Trash Into Solar Panels
http://www.takepart.com/article/2014/08/19/scientists-turn-toxic-trash-solar-panels?cmpid=tpdaily-eml-2014-08-20
Lead from old car batteries can be recycled to create renewable energy.
(Photo: Armend Nimani/Getty Images)
August 19, 2014 By David Kirby
David Kirby has been a professional journalist for 25 years. His third book, Death at Seaworld, was published in 2012.
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Researchers at MIT have announced a novel technology to recycle lead from discarded car batteries and fashion it into long-lasting solar panels.
That means that after your old car battery dies, it may one day find new life, creating enough clean, renewable energy to power 30 households while also helping to reduce lead pollution. Exposure to lead has been shown to cause cognitive and behavioral problems in children.
Professors and graduate students at the university published their findings in the journal Energy and Environmental Science. They described how recent advances in solar technology allow for the use of a lead-based substance called perovskite to make solar cells.
Amazingly, because the perovskite photovoltaic material takes the form of a thin film just half a micrometer thick, the teams analysis shows that the lead from a single car battery could produce enough solar panels to provide power for 30 households, MIT said in a statement about the discovery.
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