Let The Light In!

There is a lot of confusion over the various kinds of Solar products available.
To better understand the products available, here is a quick breakdown as to how solar power works.

Solar panels collect heat energy generated from the sun. This heat is called solar thermal energy. A simple solar panel can be a closed box with a top made of a transparent material such as glass or plastic. As the sun shines through the glass it heats up the inside of the box. This is the same type of heating that happens to a car when it sits in the sun. Normally, the inside of the box is painted black so that it absorbs more heat. The heat that is collected inside the box can then be used for several purposes. The most common uses for solar panels are to heat air or water. A system that uses solar thermal energy to heat air can be very simple. The box has an inlet pipe for cool air, this air can be circulated into the box using a fan. Inside the box the air is warmed by the power from the sun’s rays. Warm air is pushed out the other end through an outlet pipe. This warm air can be used to heat your home. Some very large systems use a solar panel on the roof of a house to heat a whole room. The warm air in that room is then blown through vents to heat the whole house. Solar panels that are designed to heat water work almost the same way as ones designed to heat air.  The terms “Solar Panel” and “Photovoltaic Panel” describe two different devices. We use the terms as follows: • A Solar Panel collects and utilizes heat energy from the sun. • A Photovoltaic Panel transforms light energy into electrical energy. • Photovoltaic Panels are used to transform sunlight energy into electrical energy. ”PV panel” is the common name for a photovoltaic panel. Literally translated photovoltaic means “light-electricity”. PV panels are made up of smaller sections called solar cells. Solar cells, are like batteries, each have a rated value of voltage (V or volts) and amperage (A or amps). The total power in wattage (W or watts) delivered is the voltage times the amperage. Volts x Amps = Watts or V x A = W Batteries can be arranged in parallel or in series depending on the requirements of the device you want to power. Every hour the sun beams onto Earth more than enough energy to satisfy global energy needs for an entire year. Solar energy is the technology used to harness the sun’s energy and make it useable. Today, the technology produces less than one tenth of one percent of global energy demand. Many people are familiar with so-called photovoltaic cells, or solar panels. The cells are made of semiconductor materials like those found in computer chips. When sunlight hits the cells, it knocks electrons loose from their atoms. As the electrons flow through the cell, they generate electricity. On a much larger scale, solar thermal power plants employ various techniques to concentrate the sun’s energy as a heat source. The heat is then used to boil water to drive a steam turbine that generates electricity in much the same fashion as coal and nuclear power plants, supplying electricity for thousands of people. In one technique, long troughs of U-shaped mirrors focus sunlight on a pipe of oil that runs through the middle. The hot oil then boils water for electricity generation. Another technique uses moveable mirrors to focus the sun’s rays on a collector tower, where a receiver sits. Molten salt flowing through the receiver is heated to run a generator. Other solar technologies are passive. For example, big windows placed on the sunny side of a building allow sunlight to heat-absorbent materials on the floor and walls. These surfaces then release the heat at night to keep the building warm. Similarly, absorbent plates on a roof can heat liquid in tubes that supply a house with hot water. Solar energy is lauded as an inexhaustible fuel source that is pollution and often noise free. The technology is also versatile. For example, solar cells generate energy for far-out places like satellites in Earth orbit and cabins deep in the Rocky Mountains as easily as they can power downtown buildings and futuristic cars. But solar energy doesn’t work at night without a storage device such as a battery, and cloudy weather can make the technology unreliable during the day. Solar technologies are also very expensive and require a lot of land area to collect the sun’s energy at rates useful to lots of people. Despite the drawbacks, solar energy use has surged at about 20 percent a year over the past 15 years, thanks to rapidly falling prices and gains in efficiency. Japan, Germany, and the United States are major markets for solar cells. With tax incentives, solar electricity can often pay for itself in five to ten years.