I know this is kinda dumb question, im just really curious why
In: Technology
I don’t think this question was answered sufficiently (or correctly) so I will add to it. It certainly is not a dumb question and is actually a huge field of solar panel development.
Firstly, both commenters are quite wrong by saying the blue panels are multicrystalline (MC). It is an understandable mistake though as you see the blue color more often with MC panels these days.
The blue color is from an antireflective coating that is applied to the panels. Thats a little ironic since silicon is naturally black. It looks like this: https://www.letsgosolar.com/wp-content/themes/solar/images/consumer-education-guide/how-are-solar-panels-made/raw_naterial.png
Though it is black, it is also very shiny like a mirror and will reflect away all the light you want to absorb. This is why they add the blue anti-reflective coating to it. Only a little bit of blue is able to bounce off this coating so much more light enters the panel.
More recent panels have better coatings that do *not* reflect blue light leaving the panels black. This black coating is put on all new panels because less reflections mean more power. We do not use MC panels much now because even though they are cheap we have learned how to make Monocrystalline (MONO) panels much cheaper than before and they are more efficient too. So both MC and MONO panels were blue in the past but we don’t make MC any more and we also use a better black coating.
Any other questions followup?
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