As found in the Friday issue of journal Science, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) came up with a way to increase solar cell output and transform colored windows into solar panels.

The technique consists in redirecting light with the help of dyes; as light is pushed to the edges and filtered, photovoltaic solar cells produce more electricity. This is not a new idea as the first time it was presented goes back to the 1970s. However, it’s been given up on because it wasn’t efficient enough.

By implementing laser technology in their experiments, MIT people surprisingly managed to significantly increase solar cell output. According to Marc Baldo, an MIT professor of electrical engineering, involved in the study, for getting such results, regular off-the-shelf dyes were used; the technology thus announces to be somewhat cheaper than traditional solar concentrators.

Solar panels semiconductors that are used for transforming sunlight into electricity. As Marc Baldo told Computerworld, although the sun represents an unlimited source of power, so far it’s been very difficult to fully profit from it because of high deployment costs. In the case of a big building, about 50 to 60 watts should be generated per square meter. Therefore, the bigger the building is, the more efficient this technology gets.

The researchers are putting together a new specialized company called Covalent Solar, that will focus on perfecting and commercializing the technology. It was estimated that a finalized product could be made available in about three years.