solar cells

greetings /sci/

I had a question about solar cells, with regard to a space habitat idea I'm kicking around.

I did a search on wikipedia. Not the best source, I know, but the fastest one. It said the efficiency/m^2 of the solar cell multiplied by the watts/m^2 would yield the total output of the solar cell, in watts. So, my questions is, what is the irradience of the sun at one AU? That is, in watts per square meter. There is a problem, i know, because the sun is a sphere, and the light rediates outward in a sphere, so technically it should be steridians, but whatever.

Wikipedia mentioned that the irradience of the sun at Earth's surface was roughly 1000 watts per square meter.

is this related on how a person can gain Solar Hands abilities ?

sure...

efficiency/m^2 = 1/m^2 (Efficiency is dimensionless, I think?)
1/m^2*watts/m^2 = watts/m^4 ... So that doesn't work.

You probably want: output=irradiance*area*efficiency.

oh shit you're right. Why the hell did i put efficiency/area? Whoops. So, any other input?

1000 watts per square meter is a good enough estimate unless you're relly close to the line.

I was listening in on a physics lecture that said that you can milk a gigawatt of power from 3 m^2 of solar panels. Interesting stuff.

Considering the distances and lengths here you can safely assume that the Sun rays are parallel ... (ie the error induced is negligeable)

The energy flux on Earth from the Sun is 1380.64 W.m^-2, when the normal to the surface passes through the center of the Sun.

You'll have to multiply this by a factor depending on the obliquity of the ecliptic, your latitude and the solar time. (I'm too lazy to do the calculations right now)