The aim is to create a smaller, cheaper, power inverter for use in solar power systems. This is both the next part of the solar power system that needs to be attacked and also, as a prize competition, an extremely efficient use of Google’s money. For by offering a prize for the winner Google will pull out of the woodwork a lot more capital to attack the problem than they’re offering as the prize.
Their site for this project is just a holding page at present so that’s all the detail we really have to go on.
However, it is well known that this solar power inverter is the next part of the solar power puzzle that needs to be attacked. The inverter is the part of the system that converts the DC power from the cells themselves into the AC power that is compatible with the grid and thus all of the various electrical and electronic machinery we already have compatible with that grid power. It’s a lot cheaper to use an inverter than it is to try and redesign everything else to run on DC power. There’s a number of more detailed technical aspects: we’d probably like to be using a pure sine wave design for example but we can leave that to the engineers themselves.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2014/05/10/googles-little-box-challenge-a-1-million-prize-for-creating-a-better-smaller-solar-power-inverter
http://www.littleboxchallenge.com - itse sivut