We all know that solar panels generate electricity by absorbing sunlight. Can they generate electricity on rainy days?

The answer is "yes".

In fact, as long as there is light, light particles can collide with solar panels to generate electricity. In rainy days, even if the sun is not visible, the board can still generate electricity.

According to Planck's law, the energy of an incident photon is inversely proportional to its wavelength. Short wavelength radiation occupies the purple end of the spectrum, including ultraviolet radiation and gamma rays. On the other hand, long wavelength radiation occupies the red end, including infrared radiation, microwave and radio waves. So in rainy days, the solar photovoltaic panel can generate electricity, but due to current technology, the efficiency of solar energy conversion is still very low.

At present, it is also possible to generate electricity through friction on rainy days, which will be converted into graphene for power generation. Because there are sodium, calcium and ammonium plasmas in the rain, the positively charged ion layer will interact with the negative electrons of graphene, resulting in a double-layer structure similar to a pseudo capacitor. The potential difference between the two layers is large enough to generate voltage and current.  

There are also many factors that affect solar power generation, such as the thickness of solar photovoltaic panels, the shuttle between photovoltaic panels and other particles, resulting in energy loss. Another factor affecting efficiency is the reflectivity of solar cells. To reduce the loss of reflectivity and improve efficiency, solar cell manufacturers usually coat cells with non reflective, light absorbing materials. This is why solar cells are usually black.

With the development of clean energy in recent years, solar energy will become the most efficient energy under the general trend of carbon neutralization.

This is the end of the photovoltaic class. In the next issue, I will introduce the basic installation methods of photovoltaic flexible modules!