Warmer temps could mean less solar panel efficiency

Renewable Energy World: Last month, MIT researchers Ian Peters and Tonio Buonassisi presented a study forecasting that global warming will negatively impact the effectiveness of solar photovoltaic (PV) cells. The power output generated by PV, according to the scientists, drops by 0.45% for every degree of increased temperature.

Put simply, solar panels work by allowing the sunlight to set electrons inside a photovoltaic cell loose from atoms, which creates an electric current. One solar panel includes many small photovoltaic cells, and the increase in temperature hampers this process.

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