Solar power is a new concept and there will always be apprehensions before adopting it. However, if you can understand the basics of how does solar power work, you’ll make an educated decision on which solution works to solar power your house. The building block of solar energy is the photo voltaic cell or PV. There has been a lot of research and development around PV over the last ten odd years, primarily due to a push from the government. Today you have many products in the market and picking one can be really tough. This is where understanding about solar energy is useful.
The sun as we see it today, is one of the largest nuclear reactors known to man. The reactions within the sun continue to produce energy in the form of light. Light consists of photons which are characterised by two factors: wavelength and frequency. The wavelength of a photon is the distance between two photons in the same phase of motion and the frequency is the rate at which the photons change their phases.
Wavelength or frequency of the light is important to understand as it determines the color of the light. The sun tends to radiate a lot more energy in what is known as the infra-red range as compared to the visible light range. This implies that if you want to maximise the efficiency of your solar equipment it must operate at the infra-red range. Another factor is in this case of light absorption. The sunlight is basically white, and any white object reflects all the light that falls on it. Along the same lines a black object is one that is absorbing all the light that falls on it. It is clear that you want something that is closer to black for your solar equipment.
The total energy radiated by the sun can satisfy our growing energy demands many times over. In fact, if we can generate 6 kWh of power from 5 square meters of PV cells, that energy is sufficient to power our whole house with all the appliances for that day. Just imagine the sheer quantity of energy we have been neglecting for centuries. Tapping the solar energy is basically, facilitating a photonic reaction between the sunlight and the PV to convert the light energy into electric energy that can be used to power our home. Of course, if you do not have the optimum solar energy absorption you will end up with an inefficient system. Learn more about solar power benefits at the Home Solar Power Guide.
There are some materials that are transparent enough to pass radiation through them but at the same time are good insulators not allowing the heat to escape. These are very important in building solar power equipment. A good choice for such functions is regular glass with iron silicon impregnations. This can pass a wide range of light wavelengths and also block the heat. Here it is useful to understand the concept of a filter. A filter in light terminology is a device that allows certain wavelengths to pass, but reflects the others. A very good example of filter is our sunglasses. We get sunglasses that reflect UV rays and pass visible light. Similarly coatings on windows to block bright light are another example. Filters play an important role in glazing for solar water heaters. The aim is to maximise the energy collection from the sun’s rays which happens to be in the infra-red range the filters used for glazing are designed to pass these wavelengths and filter the less productive colors.
So there are three characteristics of any material: filtering, absorbing and reflecting. Even the windows made from glass that are supposed to pass white light do not do so completely; they actually pass just 85% of the light and rest is lost or filtered. Another common filter is our atmosphere. During dawn and dusk the sun’s rays travel further in the atmosphere and hence they are not that strong or bright. At noon, with sun directly overhead, the light travels perpendicular to the atmosphere so it traverses shorter distances this means it gets filtered less and hence is more powerful. To find more information like this about solar power visit the Home Solar Power Guide.
The same idea holds true for summers and winters as well. During summer more of the sun’s light reaches the earth surface as compared to winters. As a result, more sunlight is reflected and absorbed in summer. Absorption of photons releases energy in the form of heat and this heat warms the air. This why summers are hotter and winters are cooler. In fact, heat is nothing but a function of motion. When a surface absorbs energy its molecules start to vibrate and this generates heat. Thus when solar energy strikes the surface it causes the molecules to vibrate releasing heat energy. These are some of the basic aspects of solar energy that you must be aware of. Understanding these concepts will aid you in understanding how solar power equipment works.
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Posted in Solar Energy.Tagged with alternative energy, energy independance, environment, green technology, home improvement, Renewable Energy, Solar Energy, solar panels, solar power, sustainable energy.By Richie Vee – February 22, 2011