History Of Solar Panel

In 1839, French physicist Edmond Becquerel first discovered the photovoltaic effect while experimenting with an electrolytic cell made up of two metal electrodes. In 1883, American inventor Charles Fritts developed the very first solar panel using thin layer of selenium on gold with efficiency less than 1%.

Modern day silicon solar cell that dominates today solar panel market was invented in 1954 by Bell Laboratories, USA. Then it was called the "solar battery".  G.L. Pearson, C.S. Fuller, and D.M. Chapin created the first solar panel using several strips of silicon. This very first silicon solar panel merely had 6% of efficiency. Below pictures show the first silicon solar panel from Bell Lab.

I couldn't find the power output of this panel. Looking at the size of the panel and knowing it had 6% of efficiency, I guess the output was less than 5 watts.

For more info visit http://www.porticus.org/bell/belllabs_photovoltaics.html