Solar panels that repel dust could save 10 billion gallons of drinking water every year

Sign up to our free weekly IndyTech newsletter delivered straight to your inbox Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy Scientists have developed a new way to clean solar panels using electrostatic charge that could save billions of gallons of drinking water each year. “They’re pushing the boundaries, trying to gain a few per cent here and there in improving the efficiency, and here you have something that can obliterate all of that right away.” open image in gallery The electrostatic cleaning system was adapted from a method used by Nasa’s Mars rover to clean its solar panels Electrostatic charge has been used in the past by Nasa to remove dust and other small particles from the solar panels on Mars rovers, however it had previously been impossible to use this version of the technology on Earth due to the humidity. The researchers developed a lab-scale prototype that demonstrated up to 95 per cent recovery of lost power output using the electrostatic dust removal technique, which the researchers claim can be used in most geographical areas on Earth, even the driest deserts. The study, titled ‘Electrostatic dust removal using adsorbed moisture-assisted charge induction for sustainable operation solar panels’, was published in the journal Science Advances.