Solar panels that don’t require direct sunlight have been invented in another leap forwards for clean energy.

A Filipino engineering student designed the revolutionary material using luminescent particles from fruit and vegetable waste.

Carvey Ehren Maigue, 29, won the James Dyson Foundation Sustainability Award in 2020 for the panels he constructed at Mapua University in the Philippines.

As they do inside crops, these particles absorb the sun’s ultraviolet rays and turn them into visible light. The panels are then able to convert this harvested light into electricity.

Ultraviolet rays still reach us on cloudy days, meaning there is huge potential to scale the technology up in urban areas – as well as in other places that a conventional solar panel wouldn’t sit.

Inspired by auroras and called AuREUS, the particles are placed in a resin surface which can be moulded into different shapes.

Discussing his invention in 2020, Maigue said he wanted to bring the product to the market immediately while also investing in further research.

“I want to create threads and fabric so that even your clothes would be able to harvest ultraviolet light and convert it into electricity.”

The prototype was a three-by-two foot panel installed in a window of Maigue’s apartment, capable of generating enough electricity to charge two phones each day. But he has ambitions to clad whole buildings in AuREUS, turning them into vertical solar farms.

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