Renewable energy : sustainable concepts for the energy change / edited by Roland Wengenmayr and Thomas Bührke.

Original ed. : c2008.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Foreword Eicke R. Weber Preface Kael W Boer Foreword First-hand Information 1 Thomas Buhrke and Roland Wengenmayr The Development Renewable Energy Sources -- a Survey 4 Herald Kohl and Wolfhart Durrschmidt Wind Energy A Tailwind for Sustainable Technology 14 Martin Kuhn and Tobias Klaus Hydroelectric Power Plants Flowing Energy 24 Roland Wengenmayr Solar Thermal Power Plants How the sun gets into the Power Plant 28 Robert Pitz-Paal Photovoltaic Energy Conversion Solar Cells -- an Overview 36 Roland Wengenmayr New Materials for Photovoltaics Solar Cells from Ribbon Silicon 44 Giso Hahn CIS Thin-film Solar Cells Low-priced Modules for Solar Construction 52 Nikolaus Meyer CdTe Thin-Film Solar Cells On the Path towards Power-Grid Parity 56 Michael Harr, Dieter Bonnet and Karl-Heinz Fischer Geothermal Power Generation Energy from the Depths 60 Ernst Huenges Biofuels Green Opportunity or Danger? 69 Roland Wengenmayr Biofuels are Not Necessarily Sustainable Twist and Turns around Biofuels 72 Gerhard Kreysa Biofuels from Algae Concentrated Green Energy 79 Carola Griehl, Simone Bieler and Clemens Posten The Karlsruhe bioliq(R) Process Synthetic Fuels from the Biomass 83 Nicolaus Dahmen, Eckard Dinjus and Edmund Henrich Solar Updraft Tower Power Plant Electric Power from Hot Air 88 Jorg Schlaich, Rudolf Bergermann and Gerhard Weinrebe Tidal-stream Power Plants Sun, Moon and Earth as Power Source 95 Albert Ruprecht and Jochen Weilepp Wave Power Plants Energy Reserves from the Oceans 100 Kai-Uwe Graw Osmosis Power Plants Salty vs. Fresh Water 107 Klaus-Viktor Peinemann DLR Studies on the Desertec Project Power from the Desert 110 Franz Trieb Hydrogen for Energy Storage Hydrogen: An Alternative to Fossil Fuels? 118 Detlef Stolten Seasonal Storage of Thermal Energy Heat on Call 123 Silke Kohler, Frank Kabus and Ernst Huenges Fuel Cells Taming the Flame 130 Joachim Hoffman Mobility and Sustainable Energy Electric Automobiles 138 Andrea Vezzini Solar Air Conditioning Cooling with the Heat of the Sun 146 Roland Wengenmayr Climate Engineering A Super Climate in the Greenhouse 148 Roland Wengemayr A Low-energy Residence An Exceptional Sustainability Concept 151 Christian Matt and Matthias Schuler Building Thermography Examined Closely The Allure of Multicolored Images 154 Michael Vollner and Klaus-Peter Mollmann Subject Index 158

Edited by experienced journalists and balancing expertise with intelligibility, this comprehensive overview enables interested lay readers to take part in discussions on alternative energies. New edition with 30# more content, including the critical debate on today's "biofuels".