What is Solar Power – Your Questions Answered

Admin — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 18:58:00 +0000

Have you been wondering what exactly solar power is? Perhaps you’ve heard the term but never quite understood what it was all about. Well, here you will learn more about what solar power actually is and how it works, so keep reading . . .

Basically, solar power is energy that is actually harnessed from the sun. Although the sun is millions of miles away from earth, if we had the ability to harness all the energy coming from the sun, there is more than enough power there to provide all the energy we need for the entire earth. In fact, there is enough energy to provide plenty of energy for 10,000 earths. While you can use solar power for a variety of appliances and other items, you have to realize that this is different than using this power to produce heat.

There are two different principles that are used with solar power. If you want to produce hot air or hot fluids, then solar thermal principles are used. However, if you want to product electricity, photovoltaic principles are used instead. If you want to produce solar power, there are four components that are needed, including a batter, a charge controller, a solar panel, and an inverter.

It is the solar panels that actually get the radiation from the sun and use it to charge up the battery. Then, the charge regulator actually makes sure that the battery charges as it should. Of course, probably the most important pieces of equipment are going to be the solar panels and usually they output energy in watts. These panels can be wired in a variety of ways, although usually parallel or series wiring is done to either increase the amperage or the voltage.

So, are there benefits to solar power? Yes! There are a variety of amazing benefits to using solar power. In fact, many people all over the world are already using this type of energy to supply their electricity. Some of the benefits are as follows:

-Creation of jobs

-Protection of the environment

-Solar power is abundant and free

-Fuel supply is diverse

-Rapid deployment

As long as the sun is hanging there in the sky, we will be able to have the energy that solar power produces. In fact, there is so much energy there, more than 10,000 times the amount of energy we need is available. You should learn as much as possible about solar power so that you will know about the great benefits offered and how your life will change for the better if you decide to go with solar power instead of using other energy sources.

Whether you have a business or a home, you’ll find that solar power can offer many advantages for both. Since solar power is friendly to the environment, you will not have to worry about toxins or pollutants from this type of energy and you won’t have to worry about the issue of global warming either.

What is Solar Power – Your Questions Answered
Defines what solar power is

By Bruce Hoover
Published: 1/2/2008

What Solar Power is and How It Could Improve Our Lives

Admin — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 18:58:00 +0000

Solar energy means the energy, heat or electricity, produced directly using the energy radiated from the Sun (renewable) toward the Earth.

At any time the Sun transmits on the terrestrial orbit 1367 watts per sq meters. Taking into account the fact that the Earth is a rotating sphere, the average solar radiation at the American latitudes is of about 200 watts / m. Multiplying the average power per square meter for the land surface of the northern hemisphere moment to moment exposed to the sun you get a power greater than 50 million GW.

The amount of solar energy that reaches the Earth’s soil is so huge, approximately ten thousand times greater than all the energy used by humanity as a whole, but not very concentrated in the sense that it is necessary to collect energy from vast areas to have significant quantities. To produce energy a system requires generally high cost products, considerably expensive than other methods of generating energy.

The development of technologies that could make economic use of solar energy is an area of active research but, for now, had no revolutionary results. Solar energy can be used to generate electricity (photovoltaic) or to generate heat (solar thermal).

There are three main technologies to transform energy exploitable in the sun’s energy:

Solar Water Heater: A solar panel that uses sunlight to heat a liquid with special features, contained in its internal transfers heat through a heat exchanger.
The concentration solar panel uses a series of parabolic mirrors in a linear structure to focus sunlight on a receiver tube that runs a heat transfer fluid or a series of mirrors which concentrate plans rays at a tower where there is a boiler.
Photovoltaic Panel: A solar panel that uses the special properties of semiconductor components to produce electricity when requested by the light.

Currently, solar panels are used to provide hot water (solar thermal) and heating to homes and small complexes. The photovoltaic panels are used mainly to feed devices away from electricity grids (space probes, phone repeaters in the high mountains or Traffic signals, parking meters, etc.).

Obviously, these devices must be equipped with batteries that can accumulate the electricity produced in excess during the day to fuel equipment at night and during cloudy periods.

With current technology, photovoltaic panels are also sensitive to infrared radiation (invisible) of sunlight and thus produce current in the event of time clouds and rain. The amount of energy released, however, is variable and difficult to predict, this gap makes it difficult to meet at all times application of current, less than a production with a wide safety margin above the peak annual demand.

So, solar and wind power are intermittent plants that provide energy in constant movement, but is the peak of production for solar energy in summer it can offset the increased domestic demand due to air conditioners.

In Germany, as example, the citizen pays the bill in the difference between what they consume and what they produce. If the balance is positive then they get a credit. Similar legislation was recently introduced in U.S.A with a tax credit to help increase the use of solar powered systems in home energy production.

Valery Forty is the editor of the blog www.12VoltSolarPanels.net, a free online resource to help people get detailed info on solar power and read reviews on the latest products.

12 Volt Solar Panels
Reviews on Tips to Solar Power Your Life

By enrico forte
Published: 10/24/2008

Web Green Earth » photovoltaic

What is Solar Power – Your Questions Answered

What Solar Power is and How It Could Improve Our Lives