A new, first-in-the-nation
indoor solar simulator at the University of Minnesota is already pulling in millions in research funding for the school.
The equipment is set up in a roughly ten-by-ten-foot space in a windowless room at the College of Science and Engineering. It uses seven high-watt bulbs, the kind you'd find behind a movie theater projector, and focuses them with a set of special reflectors.
The light that comes off the reflectors can match the intensity of 3,000 suns.
"It's really a 'wow' kind of thing, to see that you can put a plate of steel in front of it and burn a hole that's about an inch in diameter pretty quick," says Jane Davidson, a mechanical engineering professor and one of the lead solar researchers.
Davidson and others will use the simulator to try to develop new methods and technology for capturing and storing the sun's energy with chemical reactions. The extreme heat can be used to convert water and carbon dioxide into synthetic hydrocarbon fuels. The challenge is finding ways to do so that are both practical and economical.
"The power of the facility and the ability to control it are really amazing, and it's going to be a wonderful way for us to proceed, in a very controlled laboratory setting, to develop these solar reactors," says Davidson.
The simulator cost about $450,000, but it's already brought in a couple of big grants. University researchers have won nearly $1 million from the National Science Foundation and $1.4 million in grants from the Initiative for Renewable Energy and the Environment.
Source: Jane Davidson, University of Minnesota
Writer:
Dan Haugen