You can quite easily build your own solar panel, but on the whole these panels tend to be small and do not produce the wattage necessary to power more than a simple lamp for only for a couple of minutes. When you can’t afford to hire the professionals, the most effective way to produce power from the sun would be with a solar panel kit. These build your own solar panel kits come with everything you need to successfully build your own solar panel in the comfort of your living room, but I would suggest your garage as a better option )

With large companies like GE producing these kits, build your own solar panel kits are not difficult to find and the build your own solar panel sets are very affordable and offer quicker return on your investment than purchasing and professionally installing a solar energy system.

In general the instructions are easy to follow, even for teens and children, and in no time you are on your way to your own solar power system at a fraction of the cost of a professional installation

You can involve the whole family in the building process allowing everyone to learn how a solar power system works and exactly how the components are put together. Also, when you build your own solar panel you are giving yourself the knowledge to expand your system on your own, without calling back the installers, and the ability to adapt your current system to meet new design needs.

If you are looking to build your own solar panel there are a numerous resources and guides available to help you through the process and making the choice to build your own solar panel is a great investment for your future and the world’s future.

Start making your own power at home and take advantage of this great way to educate yourself while saving money and helping the environment and learn how to build your own solar panel today.

1. Money maker

Some may say that piece of mind doesn’t go very far when it comes to a series of cloudy days. Batteries, they say, can run out or get low. From all reports, however, cloudy day issues, in a majority of the world’s climates, are not an issue.  In fact, a majority of users find that they have an excess of electricity that ends up just going to waste. Or so most people- once – thought. Although the entire US is not quite there yet most sates require that utilities buy back excess  power generated from those desiring to remain on the power grid. Although it may sound a bit odd, solar power users find that their electric meters actually run backward quite a bit of the time when solar power systems are in use. God forbid there were a few weeks of nothing but clouds and cold, but if there are the owner is free to use the power that they sold back to the utility. Past the home front, add a water wheel and a wind mill and you have a nice little income generator with the electric utility paying you.

2. Cost savings

All one has to do these days is open up an electric and heat bill to see how much it costs to heat and light your home. Solar power is a great way to just about eliminate the costs associated with lighting and heating your home. For those that are using solar powered heating and lighting equipment today there is little if any cost associated with heating and lighting their homes. Yes, there is an up-front cost to installing these units but pay back times through cost savings and tax credits are getting shorter and shorter due to better technology and awareness. These current users report that they actually make money from using solar power systems just by paying a little closer attention to how they use the power that they have. For the most part, they indicate that a 30 second glance at back-up batteries for piece of mind is all the extra time required to start saving money.

2. Money maker

Some may say that piece of mind doesn’t go very far when it comes to a series of cloudy days. Batteries, they say, can run out or get low. From all reports, however, cloudy day issues, in a majority of the world’s climates, are not an issue.  In fact, a majority of users find that they have an excess of electricity that ends up just going to waste. Or so most people- once – thought. Although the entire US is not quite there yet most sates require that utilities buy back excess  power generated from those desiring to remain on the power grid. Although it may sound a bit odd, solar power users find that their electric meters actually run backward quite a bit of the time when solar power systems are in use. God forbid there were a few weeks of nothing but clouds and cold, but if there are the owner is free to use the power that they sold back to the utility. Past the home front, add a water wheel and a wind mill and you have a nice little income generator with the electric utility paying you.

3. Off the grid

There is a certain segment of the population that just does not want to be connected to the,grid, as the power and information society calls it. For these people solar power is a great option. Solar units are fairly low cost and getting lower cost every day. For survivalists or even for a farmer that needs to irrigate his crops in the middle of nowhere, solar is the way to go.

4. Develop a new technology

Man at his basic is a curious being. What if? Is always being thought about whether it’s just a casual thought during the day or figuring out how to get to Mars. Advancing technology is just who man is. Using solar may satisfy our current environmental issues but it also satisfies our intellectual needs. If solar power isn’ t used it won’t advance and our need to know won’t be satisfied. Intellectually, solar is a great idea.

5. Leave the world a better place

Throughout time man has found a way to screw up the planet in one way or another. Most of the time, man has screwed up because of ignorance or with good intentions. Using solar, at the moment, appears to be one of those good intentions. It may end up being a bad thing 200 years down the road, but for now, it may be one of the only ways to leave the world a little better then when we got here.

Indeed, solar panels nowadays, especially those that can be used to provide enough power for most of your appliances, are exorbitantly priced. The price of a system can run from $20,000 up to $50,000 depending on your energy needs. This is why many regrettably have to give up plans of setting up home solar panels on their rooftops.

There are other means of acquiring solar gadgets without having to spend so much. First of all, there are many second hand or used solar panels that anyone can buy from solar dealers these are priced much less than the brand new ones but are still in good running condition.

Question: Is it okay to buy second-hand or used home solar panel for your home instead of buying a brand new one?

Answer: Of course, especially if the used solar panel that you bought is still of good running condition. However, pass up on solar items that have major defects or damage on them.

You might also decide on passing up on the old model type of solar panels on sale. Better think again. The older, very first home solar panels are the ones that are durable and really functioning well. They simply are such great buys especially if used properly and well taken care of by the previous owner.

As for the lifespan of a used solar panel, it can really be hard to tell. Some takes years and years before bogging down and needing some repair or a replacement on a spare part or two. Most of the time, the gadget is installed on the appropriate location or top of your roof and that’s it. You let it be as it needs minimal maintenance.

The main thing to do when buying used home solar panels is to avoid those that have damage on them, such as cracks and broken glass, moisture on the glass and damaged lines and connections. Unless you have extra cash to repair these defects, then it is best to steer away from these used solar products.

If purchasing your own full system is outside your budget indeed there is a more affordable way to take advantage of solar for you electrical needs.

A product is now available where you can actually rent the whole solar panel system for no more than you pay the electric company for energy.

All you have to do is pay a flat monthly rent. You generate your own, renewable energy from the solar panels you rent and this power offsets the power you were buying from your utility. Your savings can cover the monthly rent and even put money back in your pocket. And since your rent is locked in for up to 25 years, you can save significantly over time as electricity prices continue to rise.

These are some of the benefits the customers receive:

-No upfront investment, no need to become a financial expert to justify your investment.
-No waiting for rebates.
-No headaches with the city and the utility; let us handle the engineering, procurement, and construction.
-With our flat monthly rent and our “Performance Guarantee” you can generate your own, renewable electricity and pay for the rent with your savings. Since your Agreement will show the amount of energy your system can generate, it is simple to calculate your savings.
-Hassle-free operating and maintenance; it’s handled by the experts.
-Actual hedge against future utility price increases: you can “lock in” your rates for the electricity generated from the solar system at your home for a period of up to twenty-five years, far longer than the guaranteed rates offered by other electricity providers.

Indeed, a solar panel, whether brand new, second hand or rented, is definitely a wise choice as it helps you in minimizing your electric bills, helps the worlds growing energy needs and is especially an environmentally healthy and helpful choice.

As the experts are shouting louder about environmental melt-down, the amount of solar products on the market over the last few years has significantly increased. This is not only good news for those of us who are determined to be greener within our everyday lives but also for those of us wanting a larger range of products in general. For the gardeners out there, the range of solar products for garden use just gets bigger and bigger. Below we take a closer look at some of the benefits of using solar water features.

There are plenty of different innovative solar water features on the market so what are they and why would you choose them?

Solar water features are usually placed in the garden and involve using the power of the sun to move the water within the feature. They are normally powered by a little pump which derives its energy directly from a photovoltaic cell which converts solar power into electricity. Differing water features which are suitable for solar power usage include, cascading waterfalls and fountains.

The benefits of using solar powered water features include:

• An environmentally friendly way of enjoying garden water features
• The constant relaxing sound of running water to be enjoyed throughout the sunny days when you are in your garden
• Versatility in the number of different materials the feature can be made from, ranging from terracotta to metal
• No mains electricity supply needed and so no strain put on electricity bill
• An easy way to brighten up a corner of your garden, decking, terrace, balcony or patio
• Many solar water features are self-contained which means that you recycle the same water over and over again

Uses for Solar In Every Day Life

Solar energy is an important advance in the effort to save the environment. Perhaps the most easily usable and most convenient of the renewable energy sources (which also include wind and water), solar energy has been used since the beginning of time as a heating source. In the 1830′s one of the other solar energy platforms was developed, as a solar energy cooker was used on a safari. Since then, many other solar energy applications have been formulated, and almost everyone can take advantage of one of these.

One of the most common of the solar energy application is to use it as a power source. Since the 1970′s, many people have been putting solar collectors on their roofs and using the resulting collected power to run their households. While having enough solar collectors to obtain power that will run an entire house may not be common, it is becoming more so. Most of these types of solar powered homes run their appliances and other needs directly off the solar collectors’ power during the day, and use power that was stored from the solar cells in batteries at night. In this way, the homeowner can avoid ever having to use power that was generated by a non-renewable resource.

Another of the common solar energy applications is to use solar power to heat your hot water. These systems can either use passive solar energy (in the case of heating a tank of water by leaving it out in the sun) or by using solar collectors with a heat transfer fluid. These systems require the homeowner to install solar panels, behind which run tubes filled with fluid. These tubes collect the heat from the sun and transfer it into the fluid   these tubes, filled with the heated fluid, then run around a water storage system, and the heat from the fluid is transferred into the water.  Another way is to have water running through the tubing and have it obtain the sun’s heat directly –  this heated water is then pumped into swimming pools, so that pool owners don’t need to run a pool heater to keep their water warm.

In the last 10 to 15 years, solar manufacturers have started to develop new, creative applications for solar power. One development is the portable solar panel, a popular product used on RVs by vacationers. On a smaller scale, there are solar panel packs that fold out like a small ledger and are used to power up anything from laptops to cell phones. As time passes, new products along this line are expected to continue to come on the market.

It doesn’t matter which of the solar energy applications you choose to implement in your own home or life   even a small change to solar power over traditional power sources can help the environment. The more we can use solar energy, the less dependent we become on non-renewable resources, and the more we help the Earth.

So let’s talk about the claims.

1. A clean source of energy.

When you think about it the energy from the sun is about as clean and as natural as you get. There is no chemical reaction that creates an undesirable waste product, there is no burning, no smoke, no extra gases formed. So in this way yes it is clean. But you also have to look at how you harness that energy. If you have to create undesirable waste such as plastic or other materials that can’t be naturally broken down; or you have to use energy that is not clean such as coal or other fossil fuel burning to create the product than you are at least decreasing the benefit of the clean power supply.

In the case of solar power you do have to create the cells which are made of plastic as well as the wiring and the housings for these cells. So there is some unseemliness to the cleanliness of this power source. The question is, does the benefit outweigh the costs? And in the case of solar power, it does seem that if the units are maintained and last for a long time they eventually will come out ahead. Not like cloth diapers which would, it seems, be a lot better for the environment than their disposable counterparts from huggies. The fact is that the bleach used to clean the cloth diapers is much worse for the environment than the disposable diaper which will eventually (though it takes many years) break down almost entirely.

2. Solar power is a cheaper source of energy than other options.

This again seems very true on the surface. After all everyone has access to the sun and the sun doesn’t charge does it? But then again the solar cells cost quite a pretty penny so it will take a while to pay them off with the cost savings. And you will have to maintain them paying a technician to come out and fix the units with expensive parts. So is it cost effective? Well again it seems as though over the long run yes solar power is a way to cheapen your energy costs considerably.  Not like recycling which boasts of a way to save the environment and cheapen the cost of those materials that are being recycled. Well both may not be as true as stated prompting many communities to “recycle” the materials that they collect from well meaning residents right into the trash.

People are always wanting serious information about solar power, but sometimes, even the serious can be expressed in fun facts, so that is what I have decided to do in this post.

Fun facts on solar power include things such as, in a single hour, enough sunlight reaches the earth’s surface to meet the entire world’s energy needs for a full year. Imagine! That information comes from the American Solar Energy Society.

Here are 12 more fun facts on solar power.

12 Fun Facts on Solar Power

1. As early as 1921, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded for experiments with solar power and photovoltaics. It was awarded to Albert Einstein.

2.  When silicon is taken from just one ton of sand, and used in photovoltaic solar power panels, that silicon can produce as much electricity as 500,000 tons of burning coal.

3.  In the U.S., there are more than 10,000 homes that get their energy entirely from solar power.

4. Nearly 200 years ago, a British astronomer by the name of John Herschel cooked food with solar power during an journey to Africa.

5. California opened its first large solar power plant in 1982.

6. Solar power can cut water bills by more than 50 percent each year in a home where a solar model replaces the electric water heater.

7. The price of photovoltaic (PV) solar power panels has dropped 200 percent over the last 30 years, according to the Department of Energy. Owners now pay between 10 and 40 cents per kilowatt-hour.

8. A study by the U.S. Department of Energy (USDOE) showed that solar power conditions were close to perfect (99 percent) in San Francisco on June 14th, 2000. On that day, 100,000 customers in that area lost power. Solar power could have provided all they needed.

9. Another USDOE study showed that the roofs of California’s city and county buildings, if covered with solar PV panels, could generate 200 megawatts of clean electricity! Cover California’s school roofs with solar power panels, and you add 1,500 megawatts more to the state’s peak power supply.

10. In California, covering every available commercial and industrial roof with solar power panels could generate all of the electricity needed in that state during the daytime.

11. Germany is making the best use of solar power, even though its climate includes many cloudy days.

12. It takes only about 8 minutes for solar energy to travel from the sun to the earth.

So there you go some fun facts about Solar Power, hope you enjoyed them.

PV solar power is different from other types. Of the two main categories of solar power, active and passive, PV solar power is active. Let’s look at it.

Solar Panel
PV solar power is an active source of solar power and relies on solar panels. You may picture them as flat, rectangular boxes on rooftops.

There are two main types of solar panel. From a distance, both look like rectangular boxes. Both convert sunlight into energy, but in two different ways. The terms for the two solar panel types are solar thermal collector and photovoltaic module.

1. Solar thermal collector: This solar panel takes in solar energy from the sun and uses it to heat air or water.

2. Photovoltaic module: This second type of solar panel collects solar energy and converts it to usable electricity.

Meet the PV

To answer the question, what is PV solar power, we must know what the PV is. The short answer is that PV refers to a photovoltaic module. “P” is for photo and “V” for voltaic.

The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines “photovoltaic” this way.

“of, relating to, or utilizing the generation of a voltage when radiant energy falls on the boundary between dissimilar substances.”

In simpler terms, “photo” refers to sunlight and “voltaic” refers to electrical energy. PV panels convert sunlight into electrical energy. Sunlight flows into the solar panel. Electrical energy flows out of the solar panel.

A PV solar panel is made up of many photovoltaic (light to volts) cells. These cells are electrically connected, and then covered with glass. The glass provides electrical insulation. It is also good protection from weather and other damaging forces.

When minimal energy is needed, such as that necessary to power a small appliance, a single PV solar panel is sufficient. When more power is needed, an “array” of solar panels is created by connecting panels to one another. If the power will not be supplied to the power grid, the solar panel(s) is connected to a charge controller, and battery. If it is intended for on-grid use, the solar panel array will be connected to an electrical inverter.

What Is PV Solar Power?

PV solar power is solar energy in the form of sunlight, which has been collected by a photovoltaic module, and converted into usable electricity.

Conventional silicon solar panels convert about 14 to 17 percent of sunlight into usable electricity. That isn’t much. Late in 2006, however, a new solar cell was introduced. Solar panels that utilize the new cell can convert into electricity 22 percent of the sunlight they collect. Theoretically, the maximum that the cells of a solar panel can convert is said to be around 26 to 27 percent of incoming sunlight.

How does it work? Let’s look at a very simple explanation.

Each photovoltaic cell in a PV solar panel is a semiconductor. When sunlight hits those cells, a certain part of the sunlight is absorbed by those silicon cells. The cells take in that part of the sunlight’s energy. The cells then transfer the absorbed sunlight’s energy to the electrons in the silicon. The electrons begin to flow, and this creates an electrical current. Metal contacts built into the top and bottom of the PV cells draw off that current and it is sent to the grid or battery. It is now usable electricity. The power grid sends it on its way, if you have used an on-grid connection. If you are using a battery, it is stored in the battery awaiting your need.

PV solar power is being used increasingly with great success, and while it is true that cloud cover can affect it, the cloudy country of Germany leads the world in successful use of solar panels.

With rising energy prices and concerns for the environment and about national security, homeowners are looking at solar energy options. A new federal tax credit, plus some state and local incentives, encourages adopting solar systems. The government offers a tax credit for 30 percent of the cost of a solar electric or solar water heating system. There is no cap for business owners; homeowners receive a maximum $2,000 credit for each system installed.

These credits make solar energy systems a feasible solution for hot water heating and electricity production for many building owners. Many homeowners already benefit from solar heating for their pools and spas without government incentives.

“As awareness grows, along with summer air-conditioning bills, we expect thousands more to consider their solar options,” says Brad Collins, executive director of the American Solar Energy Society, based in Boulder, Colorado. “With continued rising energy costs, consumer interest in clean, renewable energy from secure U.S. energy sources, and federal tax incentives, we believe more homeowners and business owners will look for sustainable alternatives,” he adds.

In most states, another advantage of solar electric systems (also called photovoltaic or PV) is the option to send excess energy back to your local utility grid. For example, if you are a residential customer, your system may generate more electricity than you need during the day when your family is away at work and at school. Net metering allows you to send this excess electricity to the grid, spinning your meter backwards, and reducing or offsetting the electricity you use at other times.

Today, solar energy equipment is high quality and reliable; it is backed by warranties from large, reputable firms and installed by experienced contractors. There are also many resources to learn more about solar energy, have look around the site to see if something interests you.

Sprucing Up Your Garden With Solar

Mention solar power and people get an image of large, bulky solar panels on the roof of a home. This stereotypical view is really incorrect as large panel systems are now going the way of the dodo bird. Current solar technology is all about small size and unique applications. Heck, they even make them for kayaks now.

Solar fountains may sound like a fairly complex landscape addition. They really aren’t. Solar technology has advanced to the point where most landscaping items are now best run on solar technology. This includes solar lighting used for paths, overhead lighting, bird deterrents and general ambience.

At their root, solar fountains are incredibly simple pieces of machinery. The solar aspect of the piece is simple the power generation for the pump. Practically all solar fountains look the same as regular fountains. The energy source is simply a small panel system either connected directly to the fountain or placed in a location that gets plenty of sun. The type of system is dependent upon the amount of flow you want to move with the pump.

Solar fountains range from incredibly simple to complex applications. You can buy floating solar pads that you simply put in a pool. The panels look like black pads and power a small pump that sucks content out of the pool. More sophisticated solar fountains include entirely contained systems as well as systems that move massive amounts of the pool from low points on your property to higher areas where gravity takes over. There really is something for everyone in this area.

Much like solar lighting, solar fountains are a cost saving addition to your landscaping and provide soothing ambience. Plenty of quality models exist, so give them a look.