Artificial lights for power?

[Optimistic Paranoid]

So I was reading an article on Truck Camper Magazine, and the guy mentioned that:

"At Walmart, we always park under a bright mercury light array for security, but also to charge our batteries via the solar panels."

Never heard of that before.  Wonder if it really works?  Anybody here tried it?

 

[SternWake]

I think high voltage panels are the call on that possibility

I can get a tenth or a two ov a volt in bright moonlight with 12v panels, but would need 12.x+ to do any charging

 

[lenny flank]

I do get a charge from the panel when I park under a bright parking lot light---but it's only a trickle and not all that significant.

 

[CautionToTheWind]

One youtuber mentioned worked for him...don't recall if he mentioned 'how much' though.

 

[TMG51]

I've had the same thought before, but I find that my charge controller doesn't even recognize input from one of those lamps.

 

[rvpopeye]

The Walmart here switched to LED lot lights last year.
(Probably coming to a Wally near you soon.)
My panel would just turn on before @.1amp but not now....
On the plus side , the new lights show rain and snow really well

 

[highdesertranger]

I noticed this in Alaska while staying overnight at a Fred Mayer right under a light. I had 2 12v marine batteries and I had an automatic splitter that would make a loud clicking noise when one battery was full and the splitter would click sending the power to the other battery. woke me up in the middle of the night. highdesertranger

 

[John61CT]

New solar tech for low light, even indoors

https://arstechnica.com/science/201...wer-small-electronics-indoors/?mbid=synd_digg

 

[MrNoodly]

I was parked at a casino when my MorningStar MPPT charge controller started flashing an error code. I did a reset but it kept doing it. There was nothing more I could do, so I went to sleep. Everything was back to normal in the morning. It happened again a couple of months later at a Walmart. It finally dawned on me. Both times I was parked under the lights. There was something about the type or amount of light and the current being sent from the panel that freaked out my controller.

 

[DannyB1954]

There was something about the type or amount of light and the current being sent from the panel that freaked out my controller.

Even though one can not see it, most lights running on A/C flicker 60 times a second. This may have caused the panels to send a pulsating D/C current to the controller.

 

[StarEcho]

Funny, I just read an article right before I saw this thread:

New device can harvest indoor light to power electronics

https://arstechnica.com/science/201...ic-cells-can-power-small-electronics-indoors/

Talks about a new type of PV cell that can create power from indoor light.  Sounds like it would also work for the parking lot lights I'd think.  Anyway, it's just research at this point, but interesting.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

Let's get real.  You don't get something for nothing.  

If you could focus all the light from a 1000W bulb evenly onto a 100W panel and if all 1000W is at the correct light frequencies, you can get ~6 amps at absorption voltage.  Now move that light 20 feet up on a pole and you get, at best 17% of the light onto your panel (inverse square law) = ~ 1 amp at a low 12 volts.  The voltage might be enough to push that 1 amp into a severely depleted battery, but after the battery gets to about 60%, the voltage would be too low to continue to charge the battery.

And this is with ideal conditions.  None of the current lights used in security lighting (I don't know about LED) have more than ~40% of their output in the frequencies that common solar cells can use.  The focus of the lights is poor, with that 1000W spread in all directions.

One should be able to charge something like a cell phone off the output but not much else.

 -- Spiff