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Infrared solar panels even work at night, but can't output energy
Endgadget ^
| Feb. 02, 2008
| Ryan Block
Posted on 02/03/2008 10:54:24 PM PST by PeaceBeWithYou
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To: PeaceBeWithYou
21
posted on
02/04/2008 8:59:24 AM PST
by
Kevmo
(SURFRINAGWIASS : Shut Up RINOs. Free Republic is not a GOP Website. It’s a SOCON Site.)
To: Moral Hazard
For the same reason solar power isn’t called perpetual motion. The energy came from another source and we just tap off of it. The earth rotates around it’s axis and around the sun, There is quite a lot of energy there if we could only tap into it. And no one would call that perpetual motion either, but it would be considered free energy.
22
posted on
02/04/2008 10:15:36 AM PST
by
Boiling point
(If God had wanted us to vote, he would have given us candidates.)
To: Boiling point
“For the same reason solar power isnt called perpetual motion. The energy came from another source and we just tap off of it. The earth rotates around its axis and around the sun, There is quite a lot of energy there if we could only tap into it. And no one would call that perpetual motion either, but it would be considered free energy”
Actually I think I understand what I didn’t understand before. You can’t generate energy from heat in an area where there is constant heat, i.e. you need a temperature gradient. In this case it’s absorbing infrared radiation from objects that are hotter than the background heat level, so it doesn’t violate the entropy requirement.
At least that’s how it looks to me, but I’m still not an expert.
23
posted on
02/04/2008 4:34:55 PM PST
by
Moral Hazard
(Fred Thompson/Joe Don Baker in 08, because America needs bald, beefy character actors!)
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