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Sun Flower
SUN SEEKER: The smartflower tilts toward the sun.
A new flower-shaped solar panel follows the sun as it moves across the sky—just like a real plant. The smartflower, created by a company of the same name based in Austria, has petal-shaped panels that open at sunrise and close at night. The panels tilt throughout the day to get maximum exposure to sunlight, which the smartflower converts into electricity.
The smartflower’s manufacturers say that its sun-tracking abilities allow it to generate up to 40 percent more energy than traditional stationary solar panels. They estimate that even in cloudy places, it can produce a significant portion of the energy needs for a household.
The graph below shows the amount of solar-power capacity installed in the U.S. each year since 2008. What factors might contribute to the growing popularity of solar power?