Question: when a solar panel absorbs light how is it converted into energy?

Willem Heijltjes answered on 12 Mar 2014:

A solar panel has two ingredients:
1) special atoms that, when light hits them, they lose an electron
2) one-way streets for electrons

What happens is: light creates loose electrons by hitting the special atoms in 1). The loose electrons will flow back to the atoms, which are now missing an electron – this is an electric current. But because of 2), the current can only go one way: out of the solar panel, through your electric device to power it, and back!