Did you know that you can build your own solar panels, saving $10,000 off retail price? There is now a step-by-step video guide online right now that can show you how to reduce your power bill by making your own solar panels.
Click Here to see the guide.
Four home home solar power books I thought looked interesting:
Click on the images to read the full descriptions and customer reviews.
Every now and again along comes an invention that makes you think “Why on earth hasn’t it been done before?”
New Jersey based Entech Solar have devised a solar panel that produces both electricity and hot water at the same time. The panels contain PV cells as well as a fluid pipe that heats water.
“The devices will be set up in arrays ranging from 100 kilowatts to 5 to 10 megawatts in size and sold largely to industrial customers and corporate campuses”
Sadly not available for home use but it’s a pointer to the future.
Via Greentech Media
Harnessing the power of the sun is not a new concept but as today’s technologies increase in sophistication and power, new means and methods of bringing the energy provided by the sun to all of us are attracting attention in the media.
The beauty of home solar power is that architects can incorporate home solar power solutions into their original plans for buildings. Solar power, however, isn’t just being used for an energy source. Although many buildings are including a so-called ‘Active Solar’ concept; technologies that are used to turn common sunlight, or solar energy, into tangible and usable heat or electricity.
Active Solar systems, however, do require electronic or mechanical mechanisms to drive their functionality. In turn, this requires some form of energy which is more than likely to consume the ‘conventional’ energy sources of oil, gas or coal. An alternative to ‘Active Solar’ is the complete opposite, ‘Passive Solar’. A ‘Passive Solar’ system will incorporate technologies that will turn sunlight into usable energy but with a limitation on the amount of active mechanical systems required to drive the passive solar system. This will, virtually, eliminate the need for any conventional energy consumption at all, although it is still rare to find an entirely independent passive solar system available. The common image that is created when passive solar energy is described are solar panels on the roof of a house in a sun drenched country. This isn’t always the case. A ‘passive solar’ system can even include a solarium, or glass room built to ‘trap’ the sunlight, attached onto a house. The clear benefit of passive systems is of course the almost non-existent operating costs and the incredibly reduced emission of ‘greenhouse gases’.
First some obvious advantages:
It’s free. Once you are set up there are no ongoing costs, whether it be used to generate electricity or for heating water.
It’s literally inexhaustible. It will always be there in our lifetime.
It’s non-polluting with zero carbon emissions. Good for reducing greenhouse gases and global warming!
It’s silent and has little visual impact. No noisy generators, no ugly power stacks.
And, unfortunately, some disadvantages:
The initial costs may be high, especially for electricity generation. It may need a long payback period, often several years, before the costs are recovered.
It doesn’t work well at night (duh!)
It isn’t as effective if you live in an climate where there is a lot of cloud cover, or in northern latitudes where the intensity of sunlight isn’t as high.
Obviously given the advantages and disadvantages of using residential home solar power are down to your unique and individual circumstances. If you feel you can afford the substantial up-front investment and you live in a sunny climate home solar power make a lot of sense. Living in the far north under a cover of cloud for 10 months of the year? Not such a good idea.
All of life here on this planet is made possible by the light and heat from the sun. Without our sun, we would not be here. There is an unlimited supply of home solar power. It has been there for several billion year and should continue for many billion more. It causes absolutely zero pollution and creates no carbon-dioxide greenhouse gases.
The question I put to you is “why are we not all using this free unlimited source of energy?” We have all been spoiled by relatively cheap energy derived from fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas. These are no longer as inexpensive as they once were and the carbon dioxide being release when we burn them in our power stations is undoubtedly leading to climate change.
Free solar energy has a number advantages over conventional fossil fuel sources of energy. The power from our sun is free and unlimited. Our only expense is that of collecting, using and storing this energy. These cost of recovery, whilst still high, are falling as new technology comes on line and it’s now becoming possible to generate much of the power for your own home from alternative energy sources, such as solar and wind power.
There are two main methods for recovering solar energy for the home:
Flat-Plate Hot-Water Collectors: These can allow every home to provide free hot water heated directly by the sun. They are relatively inexpensive to buy and install and have a payback time that makes these an economical prospect in sunnier climes. They are often composed of a number of copper pipes running through an enclosed sealed panel. They are mounted on a south or south-west-facing wall or roof and will provide hot water dring most of the year, even on cloudy days.
Solar Electricity Generators: These are photo voltaic cells which convert sunlight directly into usable electricity. These cells have become the world’s fastest-growing energy technology with production doubling every two years. This increase in manufacturing capacity has caused the prices of these cells to fall to a level that is affordable for use in home home solar power generation.
Recent Comments