And the profits grow

[Kevin]

Thus the efficiencies aren't equatable between the techs. A theoretical 100% efficiency with the nanocrystals would be 200% efficiency for the silicon panals. Even if you got to 60% efficiency with nanocrystals you would have already surpassed the maximum offered by the silicon.

Can you source this? Just because the figures we quote are watts doesn't mean they are based on anything to do with electricity. The watt (symbol: W) is the SI derived unit of power, equal to one joule of energy per second. It measures a rate of energy use or production. (SI is the International System of Units from the French from the French Le Système International d'Unités hence the SI abbreviation). So what is a joule? A joule is the SI unit of work or energy, equal to the work done by a force of one newton when its point of application moves through a distance of one meter in the direction of the force.

You can meaure, heat, electricity, the work done by a horse, etc in watts. What I read from you is saying that you get 200% efficiency from input energy. So that would seem to me to say that you could, if you were clever, create a perpetual motion device. You use an electric lamp to shine UV light on your solar panel which provides the energy for you UV lamp. How can you do this? Because the panel is producing 2 times the power that it is getting.

Again I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't follow what you say and what you say seems like it would break the laws of physics. Of course being of a scientific bent, I'm open to the idea that those laws are breakable (mainly because we don't understand them fully so we are misinterpreting something) but since they pretty much can be used to explain pretty much everything we observe I'm siding with them and using them like they are truths. And while you can change my mind (you can pretty much change my mind about anything), changing my mind about the laws of thermodynamics and the speed of light being constant is going to take some doing. :)

If a business can invest in retooling their company to solar power and save over time they will do it fast. That's the second level of exponential advancement i mentioned earlier related to technology. As any technology advances along and becomes more effecient the amount of money going into it's development also goes up increasing the rate of advancement exponentially.

Please keep in mind that nuclear power got slowed down on this curve because of government restrictions. I'm not fully convinced that they were needed, I'm also not fully convinced that they weren't needed. Unsafe things were being done in the early years of nuclear power and things may have been worse had governments not stepped in. It's possible they saved us from big issues. It's also possible they simply squashed the progress that would have allowed us to make things safer faster and to make the power more efficient and cleaner, etc.

You can't apply your curve to solar without applying it to nuclear either and you have to keep in mind that where we on the curve for nuclear is somewhat artificial since we were forced to stay there. Nuclear is already cheaper than coal/oil/wood/whatever. But the infrastructure can't be built for it. Again, prehaps I really do let myself be blind to the dangers of nuclear or I weigh things differently. I admit it's hard to weigh the issues of waste disposal and catastrophic meltdowns vs the effects of throwing all that extra carbon in the atmosphere and strip mining, etc. I think the long term and short term impacts of nuclear are lesser though. I could be wrong. And of course projecting it to the future you have to assume that it becomes rapidly cleaner and safer. Heck even the fossil fuels became cleaner and safer and more efficient over time.