Solar panels work best when pointed at the sun, but that orb shifts its location in the sky as the world turns. With the state's help, a Columbia-based firm has come up with a sun "tracking" device that it contends will boost the power solar panels can produce by as much as 30 percent.

Advanced Technology & Research Corp. is making what it calls a Solar Pole Tracker.  It uses a GPS-based controller to follow the sun across the sky, so that solar panels can maximize the energy they absorb.  The company hopes to market the devices for mounting on utility or light poles "in parking lots at shopping malls, business parks, train stations and park-and-rides."

The technology company -- perhaps not coincidentally located on Eli Whitney Drive in Howard County -- received a $1.1 million grant last year from the Maryland Energy Administration to produce 1,200 of its trackers. by March 2012. The state's "clean energy" economic development initiative is underwritten with federal economic stimulus funds.

ATR says it's now seeking government agencies or private businesses to try out its devices.  The gadgets cost $700 to $1760 each, it seems, but the company contends they should pay for themselves in five years' time, with income from renewable energy credits and selling power back to the electric grid.  They also could garner a little extra revenue as mini-billboards, the company points out, with advertising mounted on them, as the above image depicts.

Time will tell if they catch on. Meanwhile, the company says it's working on other solar-tracking devices, a DIY version for homeowners, and one that would be used to mount solar panels on giant industrial wind turbines.  (CORRECTION 2/17 - the solar panel tracker would go on smaller wind turbines, as seen in photo above of one placed on Tilghman Island on the Eastern Shore.) The firm says it's already made one sale, for a solar-powered electric vehicle charging station to be installed in Bethesda this spring.

(Image courtesy ATR)