DIY Applications to Enjoy the Advantages of Solar Energy

DIY Applications to Enjoy the Advantages of Solar Energy

Solar Energy Advantages

Solar energy is the process of converting sunlight into electrical power for use in a variety of domestic applications. One of the main advantages of solar energy is that it can reduce your electric bill while producing environmentally friendly power. Converting or building a home to be totally powered by solar energy is quite expensive which is probably why it hasn't caught on in popularity just yet. However, you don't have to go through the expense of a total conversion in order to start enjoying the advantages of solar energy today. There are numerous do-it-yourself guides that show how to make solar panels or how to build solar water heaters available where you can begin to reduce your commercial energy usage. You can also capitalize on self-sustaining alternative power which is great for the environment and your budget.

You can build basic solar panels yourself. With them, you can run many small appliances and gadgets in your home thus reducing your power consumption. One popular method of how to make solar panels starts with buying polycrystalline solar cells and chaining them together to form one large panel. Ebay is one place where you can purchase these cells. They are fragile so use extreme caution when handling them. Each small cell is somewhat like a battery in that the front is negative and the back is positive. Cells are typically .5 volts so tabbing two together will create a 1 volt yield. By wiring the tabbing strips in a series to make one large panel, you can achieve the desired voltage. The process of soldering these cells together is tedious but you will save a bundle of money by doing it yourself. There are many tutorials on the Internet about how to tab together solar cells.

The solar panels you build are only the first step. A typical home solar energysystem consists of the panels, a charge controller, a battery bank, and then an inverter for producing AC power to run lights, small appliances, laptop computers, electric telephones and other gadgets that don't pull a lot of amps. Batteries are connected together in a series to increase the voltage going into the inverter. Some systems use a standard car battery charger to charge the battery bank from the power grid in case of a cloudy day.

You can also save by building a passive solar water heater. A passive solar water heater involves using dark material to absorb the sun's heat and transfer it to a water collection unit. It is passive because there are usually no moving parts. Sometimes a pump might be used to help cold water along but many passive units have no pump at all and work on the principal of hot water rising higher than cold water. The water to be heated is either stored or runs under the dark material. In many applications, there is a holding tank with the hot water feed into the house coming from the top and the cold water feed going in through the bottom. Once again, there are many guides on the Internet that tell you how to build solar water heaters yourself.

You may not be able to go off the power grid but you can still benefit from solar energy. Other advantages of solar energy, besides the cost savings, are the fact that it is a renewable resource, it is clean and quiet, and the technology is constantly improving as more people consider it.

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