What is Solar Power?

It was heartening to see the Obama administration and wind industry leaders meeting at the Wind Power 2009 Conference and Exhibition. America may say that they are the world leaders in wind power generation. But is it enough? In my opinion, I don’t think so.

We must drastically reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and increase wind power generation. Whatever the hurdles are, they need to be overcome. Using nature’s resources to provide our power needs should be our first priority. There is enough wind power data available, after all the metrological departments have gathered ample data from areas where there are continuous winds blowing throughout the year. Huge wind power turbines don’t need to be installed. Smaller units can be developed. If a high rise developer in Dubai is setting up an apartment building that will be powered by wind turbines and will sell the surplus power to the neighbours, I don’t see why such projects cannot be developed in cities in America and in cities and rural areas around the world, wherever there is ample wind power.

The US government will have to take certain bold decisions to seriously develop wind power. The wind industry must be encouraged to make wind power a viable source of energy for the country. I think already too much time has been wasted and half hearted attempts made in developing the wind industry.

If there is one thing that comes to mind when we think of damaging the environment. It was waste. More to the point, paper waste. It’s not just the waste itself that is the issue, it’s the creation of paper in the first place, then the printing and then the disposal of such printed articles.

With that said, more and more companies are turning towards green printing. Well, certainly much greener to say the least. Companies offering a green printing service will, for the most part, print all of their brochures, articles, magazines and general paper based products on 100% recycled paper. This in itself is an absolutely huge step to helping the environment and saving the rain forests. Some printing companies are even taking it a step further and solely using Soy based ink when printing as opposed to the usual petroleum based inks. This is another big step towards helping the environment.

If you’re considering having some paper based products printed. Spare a few minutes to investigate the potential printing companies delivery methods, paper sources and ink types. It won’t take much of your time and you will be doing a significant bit to helping save the environment which you live in.

For those of us that were around in the early 90’s, you’ll well remember the neighbour on your street fitting solar panels to his or her roof and all the other neighbours and children looking in awe at the huge glass like panels. I know I certainly did. During the 90’s, it seemed many were opting for residential solar power as opposed to their typical electricity supply, and good on them. These days however, the whole attraction seems to have died down a bit. The utility companies are offering much better deals these days, energy saving appliances throughout the home are also doing their bit and people are realising that to save money on their electricity bill, they don’t need solar power, they just need to turn off the light when they leave the room and so on.

It’s a great shame that there are still only a small handful of people who choose to install a residential solar power panel or similar with a view of helping the environment as opposed to saving a few pounds and pence of their electricity bill. I can’t help but wonder if all them people shelling out hundreds of pounds in the 90’s fitting often ugly, old style panels to their slated roof actually saw the benefit of what solar power can be used for.

I consulted some websites for checking the requirements about how to make a solar power source for home usage. The very first thing that has to be done is an analysis of how much energy in used in the house in terms of kilowatt-hours, and what the cost of this is. Another thing is the location of your house, whether your house is located on a position that has unblocked sunlight.

While attaching the solar panels on the roof, one thing has to be done. If the location is in the northern hemisphere, the panels should be facing south and vice versa. The wiring should be in accordance with the National Electric code. In order to have the energy on rainy and cloudy days, it is important to store the energy in a battery tank. This can be done by connecting the panels with the tank through a charge controller. An AC-DC converter is needed to convert the DC from the tank into the usable AC.

Before setting up the solar system, it is important to estimate the complete cost of the panels and other items. In homes, setting up a solar source may be difficult because the Photovoltaic cells contain pure silicon, which makes them very expensive.

Some time back, I passed by a park that uses solar energy for lighting the lamps at night, and also for the fountains. I became curious about how it was done and read about it a little. Solar energy is converted using Photovoltaic cells. These are commonly known as solar cells or solar panels. The amount of electricity that a cell can produce depends upon the size of the cell. The maximum voltage is produced when the solar panel is exposed to full sunlight without anything blocking the light. Solar panels are cheap to use because there are no fuel expenses like in electricity generators.

The only cost that is incurred is that of the solar panels to be bought and fixed, usually on the roof. The cost of the cells would be determined by the watts of electricity that it produces. Due to the increase in the trend of using solar power, the prices of the photovoltaic panels have also decreased. For buying these panels, there are two options. Either new ones can be bought or one can also get used panels to save on cost. Before getting a used panel, it is important to check its output and also look for damage.