Solar Cooling - Air Conditioning From the Sun

by: Hans Dekker

At first glance, solar cooling looks like an oxymoron. However, the same energy that can provide heat in the wintertime can also provide cooling during the summer.

Several passive cooling systems have been developed and tested. At their simplest, they rely on a coolant that absorbs and dissipates heat from the house. This could be a pool of water on the rooftop which absorbs seat from the inside of the house as it evaporates on exposure to the sun.

More sophisticated passive solar cooling systems have a solar collector which is shaded during the daytime. A storage medium collects heat during the day and dissipates it at night by exposing the solar collector to the cool night air.

Since the solar collector must be shaded, a retractable awning or overhang extension can be installed. Since the system can be reversed in the winter months, it is important that the solar collector can be exposed to sunshine if needed.

Solar panels can also be used to operate traditional air conditioners. As it happens, the periods of intense heat correspond to the periods of peak electricity production from photovoltaic cells. As long as you have solar panels which generate sufficient to electricity, you can operate air conditioners at no cost.

Solar cooling that does not take advantage of high technology is another possibility. The Romans used a system of running water to cool down exterior walls of their houses. The heat of the sun causes the water to evaporate and dissipate the heat within the house. This kind of system can be used on walls or on rooftops.

Heating and cooling are two of the biggest expenses for most households. Using solar energy to reduce this expense makes sense financially as well as ecologically. The less dependent we are on fossil fuels for heating and cooling the cleaner the environment will be.

About The Author

Hans Dekker is author at http://www.alternative-energy-guide.com/ the energy site for "non techies".

Improving your home and your life only at Home Improvement Idea : http://home-improvement-idea.blogspot.com

Home Improvement – New Solar Technology

by: Rick Chapo

Solar panel systems have always been criticized as bulky and unattractive. New solar technology is beginning to make such criticisms a thing of the past.

Solar Advancement

While everyone agrees solar energy is a clean, cost-effective energy source, there has always been one problem. The solar panel systems tended to be large and rather bulky. Frankly, they don’t add to the beauty of a home. While solar panel designs have improved over the years, a new development involving shingles is getting a lot of attention.

Photovoltaic shingles are a major design breakthrough for those who have a distaste for large solar panel systems. These shingles are, well, shingles. The replace the shingles on a roof, but have the physical appearance of a regular roof. Although they are black, they do not standout from the roof in the manner of panels. Instead, the they simply look like a regular roof and many people cannot tell the difference. Obviously, this seamless design is much better than the bulky designs of panel systems.

The technological breakthrough that makes this new technology possible is the invention of thin film photovoltaic cells. Known as “amorphous silicon thin alloy technology”, the designers essentially stepped back from traditional solar panel designs and did some thinking. What they realized is the materials used in panels were not the only ones that could be used. Without getting overly technical, the design team came up with a solution where more efficient cells could be built on a steel substrate. Each super thin cell was tailored to capture different spectrums of the sunlight. When layered on top of each other, they became extremely efficient at producing power.

The ultimate result is a system that can sit directly on the roof of a home or building, is more efficient than regular solar panels and far more appealing from a visual perspective. If you’re excuse for not using solar in the past was the bulky system, you need to rethink solar.

Will this new technology become the breakthrough we have been waiting for in solar power? It already is if you consider just the following:

1. The United States Army is building a solar powered community using it.

2. Museums in Beijing, China are converting to it.

3. Habitat for Humanity is using the system on many of the homes it builds.

4. Lockheed Martin is experimenting with the technology as a power source for high altitude flights.

In the opinion of many experts, this new technology represent a major breakthrough in solar energy. With energy prices exploding, solar represents the best solution to decreasing our dependence on limited oil and natural gas resources. Fortunately, the sun will be providing free power for the foreseeable future.

About The Author Rick Chapo is with http://www.solarcompanies.com – a directory of solar energy and solar power companies. Visit http://www.solarcompanies.com/articles to read more solar electricity articles.

Improving your home and your life only at Home Improvement Idea : http://home-improvement-idea.blogspot.com

Solar Rebates For Home Improvement

by: Rick Chapo

American’s love rebates. Whether rebates are offered on computers, software, cars or whatever, we snatch them up. If your considering going solar, you’ll be happy to hear rebates are available.

Solar Rebates

As most people know, a rebate is a give back by a company in exchange for the purchase of their product. Rebates usually come in the form of money if you send in a coupon, but can also come in the form of upgrades and add-ons.

The solar technology industry is so thick with rebate programs it is hard to see the forest for the trees. You can expect to find rebates being issued by the manufacturer of a product, the federal government, your state government and possibly even your country and town or city. In many locations, the local utility company may also give you a rebate on your bill for going solar. No other source or product line has as many rebates as the solar industry. Why? Because solar represents one of the cleanest and cheapest energy sources in our country. The powers that be want to promote it for monetary and environmental reasons, not to mention providing some relief to our overtaxed national electric grid system.

Buy down rebates are the most voluminous in the solar industry. With a buy down, a government agency will pay for a percentage of the solar platform you purchase. The specific amount of the buy down depends on factors such as what the platform is used for and the amount of electricity it produces. Trust me, your local solar vendor will be able to tell you in detail about the rebate since it is a good sales technique.

When investigating rebates for your solar purchase, it is important that you don’t stop at the first program. If a state has one rebate program, it will often have as many as eight others. You can often qualify for three of four, which can cut your initial costs by as much as fifty percent.

Shining Some Light on Solar Energy

by: Jim Fritz

Without a doubt, solar energy is the way of the future. Solar energy production is an extremely simple process to understand. A solar, or photovoltaic, cell collects energy from the Sun. A solar cell is a semiconductor device that is constructed using photovoltaic materials. It contains no liquids or chemicals, and no moving parts. Solar cells convert sunlight into electricity.

A solar panel generally consists of a series of individual cells, which are supported by a module that allows the cells to work in unison. The energy that is captured by the panel is stored in a battery. Solar panels generate direct current (DC) energy. Many solar energy systems have inverters in them which allow direct current (DC) electricity to be converted to alternating current (AC). Most consumer products such as appliances and electronics operate on AC current.

Unless you have a vast expanse of land to house an array of solar panels, it is unlikely that you will be able to power your entire home with solar energy. However, it is possible to power a single room in your house with a small array of panels fixed to the roof of your house. Multiply the wattage of each individual electrical device by the number of hours you expect to use them each day. That combined number will be your benchmark, or the bare minimum your system must be able to generate.

There are a number of options available to consumers that are considering converting to solar energy. A basic system that can be used to power a computer and a few other small items can be purchased for approximately $1000.00. Naturally, the price will increase with the production capacity of your system. In most regions, the price of an installed system will cost somewhere in the area of $10.00-$12.00 per watt.

Solar energy is one of a few truly renewable resources that can be used in energy and power generation. Every hour of every day, the Sun blankets our planet with enough energy to sustain our global energy needs for a year. As the technology behind photovoltaic energy advances, consumers will be unable to resist the urge to convert.

A lot of resources are being put into the development of solar energy technology. Most of the major oil and energy companies have entire divisions committed to solar energy. Researchers and engineers are spending countless hours trying to develop the technology today that will vastly improve conditions in the world tomorrow. It is no secret that we cannot continue down the path we are on. Fossil fuels are no longer a feasible option for energy production. The future is solar. The future is now.

About The Author Jim Fritz has been a devout environmentalist for most of his adult life. He has been researching the benefits of solar energy for many years, and he is a contributing writer to http://www.thesolarguide.com – a brilliant online resource for information about Solar Energy, Solar Panels, Solar Consumer Goods and more.