Sharp debuts solar powered HDTV

If you’re concerned about your large HDTV set sending your electricity bill skyrocketing, Sharp has a possible solution with its new solar-powered 52″ HDTV, which it demoed at CEATEC 2008.  Of course, most people watch TV indoors, so it may require solar panels on the roof to be installed by professionals.

Sharp claims that the TV’s power requirement is the same as the solar panel produces (220 kWh) due to the TV’s engineering, LED backlighting and its super high energy solar panel output.  However, depending on where you live and the weather conditions around the year, it’s unclear under what condition is required for the TV to run only on solar power, even with batteries to store the built-up energy.

So far, no pricing info or timeframe for release have been announced, but it may be dicey to pay for solar panels and would take awhile to recoup the cost of those panels in energy savings. Hard to say if this one will ever really be practical in a real world sense. But it does advance the “green” cause quite a bit in terms of engineering feats.