Picasolar Ties for Second at National Clean Energy Contest

University of Arkansas startup Picasolar, which developed a way to make solar cells more efficient, tied for second at the National Clean Energy Business Plan Competition this week in Washington, D.C. The event, in its second year, is put on by the U.S. Department of Energy and brings together six regional winners from across the country. Winners were announced on Tuesday, and SiNode Systems from Northwestern University was the overall winner. SiNode created technology to improve lithium battery capacity and power density. It won the Rice University Business Plan Competition to qualify for the national DOE contest. Picasolar qualified by winning the MIT Clean Energy Prize (and $150,000). Its Hydrogen Selective Emitter increases solar power conversion efficiency and reduces the amount of silver needed to produce high-efficiency solar cells. Read the full article from Innovate Arkansas here.