ORAN’S HIGH SCHOOL OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING & ENRGETICS

Level: 1St year 2020/2021

UNIT TWO: DIAGRAMS AND DESCRIPTION OF PROCESSES

Topic One: How Technology works
Listening and speaking

Read the text and do the activities below

Photovoltaics is the direct conversion of light into electricity at the atomic level. Some materials
exhibit a property known as the photoelectric effect that causes them to absorb photons of light and
release electrons. When these free electrons are captured, an electric current results that can be used as
electricity.

The photoelectric effect was first noted by a French physicist, Edmund Becquerel, in 1839, who found
that certain materials would produce small amounts of electric current when exposed to light. In 1905,
Albert Einstein described the nature of light and the photoelectric effect on which photovoltaic
technology is based, for which he later won a Nobel prize in physics. The first photovoltaic module
was built by Bell Laboratories in 1954. It was billed as a solar battery and was mostly just a curiosity
as it was too expensive to gain widespread use. In the 1960s, the space industry began to make the first
serious use of the technology to provide power aboard spacecraft. Through the space programs, the
technology advanced, its reliability was established, and the cost began to decline. During the energy
crisis in the 1970s, photovoltaic technology gained recognition as a source of power for non-space
applications.

Every solar PV system is made up of several components: solar panels (or ‘modules’), an inverter, a
meter and an existing consumer unit. One of the most common questions people want to know is how
do solar panels work turning sunlight into AC electricity ready to consume onsite.

First of all the sun gives off light, even on cloudy days. After that, PV cells on the panels turn the
light into DC electricity. The current then flows into an inverter, which converts it to AC electricity
ready to use. Next, the current is fed through a meter and then into your home’s consumer unit. Lastly
plug in and switch on, your system will automatically use the free electricity you have generated, then
switch back to the grid as needed. Any electricity you don’t use is exported to the grid for others
to use.

Adapted from http://science.nasa.gov/science-news & http.evoenergy.co.uk

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 ORAN’S HIGH SCHOOL OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING & ENRGETICS
Level: 1St year 2020/2021

1/Listen to your teacher reading the text then do the activities below:
1- What is photovoltaics ?
2- Who was the first physicist to note the photoelectric effect ?
3- What quality of certain materials did he find ?
4- What price was Albert Einstein awarded after describing the nature of light and the
photoelectric effect on which photovoltaic technology is based ?
5- What are the different parts of every PV system ?

2/find in the text the synonym of :

Characteristic=……….. Transformation= ………….. Universal=…………………

Find in the text the opposite of :

Increase ≠ ……………. Absorb≠…………. Imported≠………..

3/Turn the underlined verbs into the opposite voice/form :

Solar (or photovoltaic) cells convert the sun’s energy into electricity.
Silicon is what is known as a semi-conductor, meaning that it shares some of the properties of metals
and some of those of an electrical insulator, making it a key ingredient in solar cells. Let’s take a
closer look at what happens when the sun shines onto a solar cell.
Sunlight is composed of miniscule particles called photons, which radiate from the sun. As these hit
the silicon atoms of the solar cell, they transfer their energy to loose electrons, knocking them clean
off the atoms. The photons could be compared to the white ball in a game of pool, which passes on its
energy to the coloured balls it strikes.

5/Use all the information above to describe how solar panels operate:
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 ORAN’S HIGH SCHOOL OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING & ENRGETICS
Level: 1St year 2020/2021