on video I turn CD/DVD into solar panel

 Can You Really Make a Solar Panel Using Old CDs?

Recently, one of those DIY hack videos popped up on one of my social media feeds. In it, the creator claimed “I turn CD/DVD into a solar panel,” which seemed interesting but improbable. So, I started watching the video and thought, there was no way that this could work—is there? I understand, basically, how solar cells, or photovoltaic cells, work. And, I really doubted that this proposed hack could work, despite the video showing a multimeter hooked up to the makeshift solar cell indicating that it did.

It's important to understand how a photovoltaic cell works—they're actually fairly simple, with three parts sandwiched together. The top and bottom are conductive contacts, while the middle is a semiconductor. Semiconductors are materials that allow electricity to flow through them, at a rate somewhere between that of an insulator—which does not—and a metal—which does so efficiently.

One of the most common semiconductors is silicon, which is what is used in photovoltaic cells. When the silicon is bombarded with photons—essentially energy from light—electrons are freed. Collecting these free electrons is how we get electricity from the photovoltaic cell, although it's a little more complicated than that. The silicon is manipulated to release the freed electrons in one direction, towards an outside layer of the cell which becomes the negative leg of the electrical circuit. As the free electrons leave that side of the silicone layer, it creates a deficit on the other outside layer, which becomes the positive leg.

Back to the video, it shows someone wrapping copper wire around a CD or DVD, going through the center hole, and working their way around it until it is covered on both sides. This leaving the two ends of the wire next to each other. To keep the wires anchored and isolated from each other, presumably, they've each been passed through holes drilled in the CD.

So, here is the first problem I see with the video. There is one wire wrapped around the top and bottom sides of the CD, so the top and bottom terminals or wire ends are not isolated from each other. And, even if that worked, there is a second problem. The wire appears to be plain copper wire, which touches where it is bunched up around the center hole—this would cause a short circuit situation.

In any event, I built one of these "cells," as shown in the video, to test—it generated zero current as I expected. One can only guess why someone would create a DIY video for free electricity that doesn't work. And, they're not the only ones. Doing a search for “DIY CD solar cells” yields a lot of videos. Some mimic the one I originally saw, some use a slightly different design, but are equally ineffective.

In the video, “Free Energy 100% , How to make solar cell from CD” they use 3 Zener diodes inline, in a loop of copper on one side of a CD. Doing this may generate some measurable voltage, but it has more to do with the diode than it does the CD or the elaboration copper wire arrangement. When excited by energy, either electricity, or heat from sunlight, the silicon in the diode can release freed electrons, similar to a photovoltaic cell, but not at a voltage or amperage that is actually useful. It would take an absurd number of Zener diodes to create a useful electric current.

 Can You Really Make a Solar Panel Using Old CDs?

Recently, one of those DIY hack videos popped up on one of my social media feeds. In it, the creator claimed “I turn CD/DVD into a solar panel,” which seemed interesting but improbable. So, I started watching the video and thought, there was no way that this could work—is there? I understand, basically, how solar cells, or photovoltaic cells, work. And, I really doubted that this proposed hack could work, despite the video showing a multimeter hooked up to the makeshift solar cell indicating that it did.

It's important to understand how a photovoltaic cell works—they're actually fairly simple, with three parts sandwiched together. The top and bottom are conductive contacts, while the middle is a semiconductor. Semiconductors are materials that allow electricity to flow through them, at a rate somewhere between that of an insulator—which does not—and a metal—which does so efficiently.

One of the most common semiconductors is silicon, which is what is used in photovoltaic cells. When the silicon is bombarded with photons—essentially energy from light—electrons are freed. Collecting these free electrons is how we get electricity from the photovoltaic cell, although it's a little more complicated than that. The silicon is manipulated to release the freed electrons in one direction, towards an outside layer of the cell which becomes the negative leg of the electrical circuit. As the free electrons leave that side of the silicone layer, it creates a deficit on the other outside layer, which becomes the positive leg.

Back to the video, it shows someone wrapping copper wire around a CD or DVD, going through the center hole, and working their way around it until it is covered on both sides. This leaving the two ends of the wire next to each other. To keep the wires anchored and isolated from each other, presumably, they've each been passed through holes drilled in the CD.

So, here is the first problem I see with the video. There is one wire wrapped around the top and bottom sides of the CD, so the top and bottom terminals or wire ends are not isolated from each other. And, even if that worked, there is a second problem. The wire appears to be plain copper wire, which touches where it is bunched up around the center hole—this would cause a short circuit situation.

In any event, I built one of these "cells," as shown in the video, to test—it generated zero current as I expected. One can only guess why someone would create a DIY video for free electricity that doesn't work. And, they're not the only ones. Doing a search for “DIY CD solar cells” yields a lot of videos. Some mimic the one I originally saw, some use a slightly different design, but are equally ineffective.

In the video, “Free Energy 100% , How to make solar cell from CD” they use 3 Zener diodes inline, in a loop of copper on one side of a CD. Doing this may generate some measurable voltage, but it has more to do with the diode than it does the CD or the elaboration copper wire arrangement. When excited by energy, either electricity, or heat from sunlight, the silicon in the diode can release freed electrons, similar to a photovoltaic cell, but not at a voltage or amperage that is actually useful. It would take an absurd number of Zener diodes to create a useful electric current.