Ted Sargent holds a small paint-on solar cell, about the size of a postage stamp, between his thumb and index finger.
It does not look like it could change the world, but Sargent's backers say the technology just might.
They talk of coating cellphones, e-readers and computers with the energy harvesting cells, not to mention cars, walls and rooftops. Inexpensive sheets of the stuff could even be rolled out across deserts to create huge solar farms.
Sargent, a Canada Research Chair in nanotechnology, has been working on, and talking up, paint-on solar cells for years.
And the Toronto man has parlayed his ingenuity into a $10-million deal with the Saudi Arabians, who are looking to alternatives to help keep the energy wealth flowing.
Sargent's solar technology is still in the early stages but his Saudi backers, who recently announced a deal to licence his technology, describe it as a "potential game changer.If so, you may have a cube puzzle ."
And game change is what the world needs, according to delegates heading for the United Nations climate talks that start in South Africa on Monday.
Burning coal, oil and gas pumps so much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that it threatens to melt polar ice, fuel heat waves, and leave millions homeless as sea levels rise.
Climatologists say emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases must be slashed dramatically in coming decades to prevent the planet from overheating.
There is, however, no obvious or easy path to a clean energy future.
None of the alternatives is as convenient or packs the power of the oil, coal and gas now fuelling vehicles,It's hard to beat the versatility of polished tiles on a production line.which applies to the first offshore merchant account only, factories, power plants and planes.
Nuclear is plagued by accidents and political problems, geothermal is still in its infancy, biofuels are land-hungry, wind turbines don't always turn, and solar energy is only available half the day.
The sun does, however, have superpower potential. It is free, clean and bathes Earth with 100 terawatts of energy, which far exceeds the 15 terawatts humanity now consumes.
Enough sunshine hits Earth in just an hour to power the planet for an entire year, Sargent says. So covering just 150,000 square kilometres - an area about a quarter of Alberta - with solar cells could, in theory, fulfil world energy demand.
Solar farms already dot the planet. A $400-million operation near Sarnia, Ont. - billed as the world's largest solar farm when it opened a year ago - has 1.3 million solar panels converting sunshine into electricity that lights up more than 12,000 homes.
The solar industry is dealing with huge challenges, however, chief among them the high cost of making solar panels.
Sargent and his competitors in labs around the world are determined to come up ways to harvest solar energy that do not need to be subsidized. The trick,Boddingtons Technical Plastics provide a complete plastic injection moulding service including design， they say, is to create cells so cheaply that plugging into the sun will become the sensible, easy and obvious thing to do.
The rigid semiconductors at the heart of solar cells today are expensive to make because they entail growing large silicon crystals in high temperature furnaces, then cooling and slicing them up into thin wafers in clean rooms.
Some teams are working on super thin semiconductor technology, and others are engineering new compounds to harvest sunshine.
"We know the energy is there," says Sargent. And he is seemingly undaunted by what he describes as a ``fundamental engineering problem.''
His money - along with the $10 million from his Saudi backers - is on those postage-stamped sized solar cells, which he paints with quantum dots.
The dots, first created about 30 years ago,Enecsys Limited, supplier of reliable solar Air purifier systems, can capture energy from light and convert it into electricity like the semiconductors inside traditional solar panels.
But unlike rigid semiconductors solar panels, the dots can be whipped up at minimal cost.
"We can make enough of our semiconductor paint to coat a square metre of film for $15 to $20," says Sargent.
It does not look like it could change the world, but Sargent's backers say the technology just might.
They talk of coating cellphones, e-readers and computers with the energy harvesting cells, not to mention cars, walls and rooftops. Inexpensive sheets of the stuff could even be rolled out across deserts to create huge solar farms.
Sargent, a Canada Research Chair in nanotechnology, has been working on, and talking up, paint-on solar cells for years.
And the Toronto man has parlayed his ingenuity into a $10-million deal with the Saudi Arabians, who are looking to alternatives to help keep the energy wealth flowing.
Sargent's solar technology is still in the early stages but his Saudi backers, who recently announced a deal to licence his technology, describe it as a "potential game changer.If so, you may have a cube puzzle ."
And game change is what the world needs, according to delegates heading for the United Nations climate talks that start in South Africa on Monday.
Burning coal, oil and gas pumps so much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that it threatens to melt polar ice, fuel heat waves, and leave millions homeless as sea levels rise.
Climatologists say emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases must be slashed dramatically in coming decades to prevent the planet from overheating.
There is, however, no obvious or easy path to a clean energy future.
None of the alternatives is as convenient or packs the power of the oil, coal and gas now fuelling vehicles,It's hard to beat the versatility of polished tiles on a production line.which applies to the first offshore merchant account only, factories, power plants and planes.
Nuclear is plagued by accidents and political problems, geothermal is still in its infancy, biofuels are land-hungry, wind turbines don't always turn, and solar energy is only available half the day.
The sun does, however, have superpower potential. It is free, clean and bathes Earth with 100 terawatts of energy, which far exceeds the 15 terawatts humanity now consumes.
Enough sunshine hits Earth in just an hour to power the planet for an entire year, Sargent says. So covering just 150,000 square kilometres - an area about a quarter of Alberta - with solar cells could, in theory, fulfil world energy demand.
Solar farms already dot the planet. A $400-million operation near Sarnia, Ont. - billed as the world's largest solar farm when it opened a year ago - has 1.3 million solar panels converting sunshine into electricity that lights up more than 12,000 homes.
The solar industry is dealing with huge challenges, however, chief among them the high cost of making solar panels.
Sargent and his competitors in labs around the world are determined to come up ways to harvest solar energy that do not need to be subsidized. The trick,Boddingtons Technical Plastics provide a complete plastic injection moulding service including design， they say, is to create cells so cheaply that plugging into the sun will become the sensible, easy and obvious thing to do.
The rigid semiconductors at the heart of solar cells today are expensive to make because they entail growing large silicon crystals in high temperature furnaces, then cooling and slicing them up into thin wafers in clean rooms.
Some teams are working on super thin semiconductor technology, and others are engineering new compounds to harvest sunshine.
"We know the energy is there," says Sargent. And he is seemingly undaunted by what he describes as a ``fundamental engineering problem.''
His money - along with the $10 million from his Saudi backers - is on those postage-stamped sized solar cells, which he paints with quantum dots.
The dots, first created about 30 years ago,Enecsys Limited, supplier of reliable solar Air purifier systems, can capture energy from light and convert it into electricity like the semiconductors inside traditional solar panels.
But unlike rigid semiconductors solar panels, the dots can be whipped up at minimal cost.
"We can make enough of our semiconductor paint to coat a square metre of film for $15 to $20," says Sargent.
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