What’s solar energy?
How does the solar energy system works?
What are the components of solar energy?
May you don’t know us yet, let’s have a quick introduction: we’re ERA architects.
Actually, I’m Esther Rovira, architect and passive house designer in Barcelona, Catalonia and Andorra for either passive houses, efficient houses and positive houses.
In this post ‘5 items of Solar energy’, You will find our professional recommendation.
I hope it helps you! Let’s go!
Why solar energy?
Solar energy is the most commonly used energy to power your positive house.
The reason is that solar energy is the largest source of natural energy ever known.
It delivers 10.000 times the energy consumed by humans.
This energy has one and only problem: clouds. Even if you have a battery system, you’ll most probably end up with no energy after 3 cloudy days.
You’ll need to check if your location has sufficient solar exposure before you choose this energy.
Solar energy has 5 main components.
1) Sunshine
First, the Sun needs to shine. No sun, no energy to capture.
2) Solar panel
The solar panel captures the energy from the Sun.
This is done within a photovoltaic process. This consists of the Sun rays interacting with the silicon cell causing electrons to move. Moving electrons create electric current.
The amount of electricity generated by a solar panel depends on 4 aspects:
- temperature (the Sun heats at different temperatures along the day)
- panel efficiency
- panel orientation (North, South, East or West) and
- solar panel slope (degree angle it’s installed)
You may also consider solar panels with:
- PERC technology (Passive emitter rear cell system with monocrystalline cells working at high efficiency over 20%).
- Multi busbar technology (Better light trapping and current collection to improve module power output and reliability).
- Reduced Hot Spot Loss (Optimized electrical design and lower operating current for reduced hotspot loss and better temperature coefficient).
- Resistance (Should be certified to withstand: a wind load of 2400 Pa and a snow load 5400 Pa).
- PID resistance (Anti-PID performance guarantee via optimized mass-production process and materials control).
- Durability (High salt mist and ammonia resistance).
- Guarantee (this type of panel should last 30 years. Then the panels should have a warranty of at least 25 years).
3) Inverter
Since the energy captured by the solar panels is direct current electricity (DC) and your house appliances work at alternating current electricity (AC); you need to transform the electricity in order to use it.
Energy in your house needs to be transformed. This is the task of the inverter.
Consider only last generation inverters with high efficiency (over 98%).
According to regulations this inverter needs to have an automatic disconnection device. You may consider those with an AI active safety system.
4) Battery
You may consider to have batteries.
However note that an ordinary set of batteries won’t storage the energy for longer than 3 days cloudy days.
5) Electric meter
May you be connected to the grid, then you need an electric meter to count the power you are supplying to the grid. Also the power that you will be taking during cloudy weeks during winter.
Consider a precise smart power sensor with a measurement precision of at least class 1.
In a positive house, you may also consider an electric meter that runs at an energy lower than 1W.
Finally, since you’ll be checking those measurements, it’s also good to choose an electric meter that has a screen and it’s easy to configure and check.
I know what you’re thinking:
Do I really need to connect to the grid?
If you don’t want to end up having a cold shower in the middle of winter, you need to be connected to the grid or have an alternative source of renewable energy.
Then you may consider wind energy if your location has sufficient wind on winter cloudy days.
Anecdote: I know this family that installed sufficient photovoltaic panels in Spain to be disconnected even in winter (at least they thought so). And they tried for a while to be disconnected. They didn’t last one winter to install an alternative source of energy. They chose a generator running with fossil fuel since it was the most easy to install and affordable at that moment. Even so, it was noisy and smelly and they ended up connecting to the grid.
You may also be interested in:
In our other post: Solar energy in Spain and price.
There are so many aspects to take into account when installing photovoltaic energy in Spain that I’ve created another post for you.
Hope this post ‘5 items of Solar energy’ is helpful!
Best of luck on this adventure.
See you on the next post,
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