Wired finally decided to put the How-to they absolutely HAD to have me write in the middle of final exams in December into their magazine and website.
They really truncated what I sent them, and didn't include any of the follow up questions they asked me after I wrote the how-to. One fun one:
Wired: How many doughnuts would you need to make a cell that produces enough energy to, say, heat your bath?
Blake: Interesting question, these are all pretty rough numbers, so bear with me. It takes about 23MJ of energy to heat up a bath tub, and to do this in a reasonable amount of time you'll need around 68 meters squared of doughnut solar cells - translating into about 100 000 doughnuts worth. You can heat up 10 bath tubs at once with only one tractor trailer load of doughnuts.A more reasonable task is lighting up a light bulb. Lets assume its pretty efficient, fluorescent or LED. It takes about 0.45 square meters to light one up, which translates into about a trash bag full of doughnuts. Lets just say this isnt the best source for purifying TiO2, and tea isn't the best sensitizing agent.