Climate change and escalating energy costs have driven many people to consider using solar energy. Solar energy can be a viable way to provide much of your hot water, central heating or pool heating requirements for your home. Solar energy can also supplement your home’s lighting and other electricity needs.
The sun is an unlimited source of free and clean energy. The quest to harness this energy began many years ago. Solar energy has become a viable alternative to provide power for your home. The sun’s energy consists of heat and light. Both are used as a source of free energy.
The sun’s heating or thermal power is commonly used in sunny climates to supplement the hot water requirements of many homes. Thermal panels are mounted on the roof of your home. Water is circulated through a series of pipes and stored in a tank ready for use. These are very effective in sunny climates but have even been used with some success in climates with few sunshine hours.
Photovoltaic panels transform the sun’s light directly into electric current. This electricity can be used to provide lighting for your home or to provide power for your home appliances. Surplus energy produced during daylight more…
Developing and mandating Solar Energy is the primary means for any nation to achieve energy independence. Vast amounts of heat and light pour out over every square inch of this planet regardless of borders, religion or laws.
Nobody owns the Sun.
In fact, that’s the main impediment to the implementation of solar energy units on a national scale. Currently, big corporations sell you devices that need energy: oil, gas or diesel. Then they charge you to refuel. Then they charge you for distribution.
Then, most importantly (from their point of view), they prevent any new technology from threatening their monopoly. Corporations have gone so far as to buy up independent patents for millions then hide them away.
Eventually, oil is going to run out. The taps on the world oil fields are running wide open now. They’re barely keeping up with demand while new deposits of oil are rare, hard to reach and expensive to obtain.
Oil reserves are finite and the companies have known this for a long time. Now the world knows as well. For world industry to keep advancing it will need to develop a new source of energy.
Now we are turning back to the original source of power, the source more…
In the Autumn of next year, the third ‘Solar Decathlon’ will take place in Washington, D.C.
When it is under way, the experts and spectators alike will see some of the best examples in the world of the relationship between design and solar power.
Comprising 20 teams - each representing universities or colleges - entrants are expected to build a house that is solar powered, and is judged on aesthetics and design.
The official Solar Decathlon website has this to say:
“Teams of college students design a solar house, knowing from the outset that it must be powered entirely by the sun. In a quest to stretch every last watt of electricity that’s generated by the solar panels on their roofs, the students absorb the lesson that energy is a precious commodity. They strive to innovate, using high-tech materials and design elements in ingenious ways. Along the way, the students learn how to raise funds and communicate about team activities. They collect supplies and talk to contractors. They build their solar houses, learning as they go.”
Perhaps the key phrase, then, is that “energy is a precious commodity”. What the Solar Decathlon competition tries to more…
