New solar power technology reduces size of panels
SolFocus, a company in Palo Alto trying to improve solar power technology, has announced that they have some new solar panel designs that magnify the solar light before it hits the photovoltaic panels, thereby increasing output compared to size. Unfortunately, they will be marketing them to industry and commercial enterprises at first.
I think the biggest stumbling block to solar power getting widespread acceptance among home owners is the cost. If you can reduce the size of the panels, and thereby reduce the cost, they would catch on more and become more popular.
Billy Ocean, Student Council Treasurer 
Unfortunately size doesn’t always matter when it comes to cost. I’ve looked into buying kits in the recent past and it’s going to have to come waaay down for the majority people to even do a double take. Starter kits were 10k just to run almost 50% of your daily needs for electricity. I agree, there should be a hell of alot more research put into this technology. Like everything else, though, until enough people can get rich off of it not much will be done.
True, size does not equal cost, but what these folks are doing should bring the cost down. Smaller panels means less silicon, means cheaper panels.
True Dat