SolarEnergy - "Photovoltaic Cell" System

Many PV "Photovoltaic cell"s, connected in series, form a PV module; several modules attached to a frame form a solarenergy electric panel. A panel can power a stand-alone system, simply and cost-effectively generating electricity away from the power lines, or it can be connected to the power grid, allowing the owner to sell the electricity generated.

Components of Solarenergy Electricity Generation

The basic components of a PV "Photovoltaic cell" system (Figure 7) include:

• PV modules which are a group of cells that generate an electric field by absorbing sunlight, resulting in direct current (DC) electricity.
• An inverter which converts the DC electricity from the PV modules into the alternating current (AC) electricity is used in the power grid and is required by most electrical appliances.

Most PV "Photovoltaic Cell" systems in operation use one centralized inverter to convert electricity from multiple panels. These large inverters involve power loss and can be noisy.

Figure 7. Photovoltaic power diagram. Courtesy of Go Solar.

Microinverters, a new technology, attach directly to each solar module in the power system.

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Obtain the Knowledge Required to Build your own SolarEnergy System

Global Green - WindEnergy - SolarEnergy

Different Types of SolarEnergy Systems plus WindEnergy Systems

Many power plants today use fossil fuels as a heat source to boil water. The steam from the boiling water spins a large turbine, which drives a generator to produce electricity. However, a new generation of power plants with concentrating solar power systems uses the sun as a heat source. The three main types of concentrating solar power systems are: linear concentrator, dish/engine, and power tower systems.

Linear concentrator systems collect the sun's energy using long rectangular, curved (U-shaped) mirrors. The mirrors are tilted toward the sun, focusing sunlight on tubes (or receivers) that run the length of the mirrors. The reflected sunlight heats a fluid flowing through the tubes. The hot fluid then is used to boil water in a conventional steam-turbine generator to produce electricity. There are two major types of linear concentrator systems: parabolic trough systems, where receiver tubes are positioned along the focal line of each parabolic mirror; and linear Fresnel reflector systems, where one receiver tube is positioned above several mirrors to allow the mirrors greater mobility in tracking the sun.

A dish/engine system uses a mirrored dish similar to a very large satellite dish. The dish-shaped surface directs and concentrates sunlight onto a thermal receiver, which absorbs and collects the heat and transfers it to the engine generator. The most common type of heat engine used today in dish/engine systems is the Stirling engine. This system uses the fluid heated by the receiver to move pistons and create mechanical power. The mechanical power is then used to run a generator or alternator to produce electricity.

A power tower system uses a large field of flat, sun-tracking mirrors known as heliostats to focus and concentrate sunlight onto a receiver on the top of a tower. A heat-transfer fluid heated in the receiver is used to generate steam, which, in turn, is used in a conventional turbine generator to produce electricity. Some power towers use water/steam as the heat-transfer fluid. Other advanced designs are experimenting with molten nitrate salt because of its superior heat-transfer and energy-storage capabilities. The energy-storage capability, or thermal storage, allows the system to continue to dispatch electricity during cloudy weather or at night.


You can build your own SolarEnergy "Photovoltaic Cell" System at home and even sell the power you make, if you build your system is large enough, back to the power company.
Below you will find links to two sites which will provide you with the knowledge to build a solarenergy system in your own backyard, "Home Solar Energy" 

They will also provide you with information on how to build a homemade wind turbine" to supplement the solarenergy system. "Home Wind Power" using an "homemade wind turbine" or wind powered generator is another project you can complete at home using the instruction from the links below. 


"Wind Turbine Design" for residential windpower is just one more way these links will sve you money on you "energy billing".


Check this out today and build your system in as quick as a weekend and they add to it over the course of the coming weeks and months.

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Globalgreen - SolarEnergy - Powering the Future

Economics and Other Benefits of Active Home SolarEnergy Heating Systems

Active solarenergy heating systems are most cost-effectivehome solarenergy, when they are used for most of the year, that is, in cold climates with good solar resources and good solarenergy cells. They are most economical if they are displacing more expensive heating fuels, such as electricity, propane, and oil heat. Some states offer sales tax exemptions, income tax credits or deductions, and property tax exemptions or deductions for home solarenergy systems.

The cost of an active home solarenergy heating system will vary. Commercial systems range from $30 to $80 per square foot of collector area, installed. Usually, the larger the system, the less it costs per unit of collector area. Commercially available collectors come with warranties of 10 years or more, and should easily last decades longer. The economics of an active space heating system improve if it also heats domestic water, because an otherwise idle collector can heat water in the summer. 


You are able, through "solar panel design", such as the instructional packages below, to build your own "photovoltaic cell" making your own solarenergy panels. These panels can be portable or fixed allowing you to chose how to use your finished product.

Heating your home with an active "solarenergy power cells" "photovoltaic cell"  energy system can significantly reduce your "energy billing" in the winter. A "home solarenergy" heating system will also reduce the amount of air pollution and greenhouse gases, that result from your use of fossil fuels such as oil, propane, and natural gas for heating or that may be used to generate the electricity that you use.

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GlobalGreen - Linking you to SolarEnergy and WindEnergy harnessing methods.

The Benefits of 20% Wind Energy by 2030

According to the American Wind Energy Association, if we increase our nation's wind energy capacity to 20% by 2030, it would…

Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions

A cumulative total of 7,600 million tons of CO2 would be avoided by 2030, and more than 15,000 million tons of CO2 would be avoided by 2050.

Conserve Water

Reduce cumulative water consumption in the electric sector by 8% or 4 trillion gallons from 2007 through 2030.

Lower Natural Gas Prices

Significantly reduce natural gas demand and reduce natural gas prices by 12%, saving consumers approximately $130 billion.

Expand Manufacturing

To produce enough turbines and components for the 20% wind scenario, the industry would require more than 30,000 direct manufacturing jobs across the nation (assuming that 30% – 80% of major turbine components would be manufactured domestically by 2030).

Generate Local Revenues

Lease payments for wind turbines would generate well over $600 million for landowners in rural areas and generate additional local tax revenues exceeding $1.5 billion annually by 2030. From 2007 through 2030, cumulative economic activity would exceed $1 trillion or more than $440 billion in net present value terms.

Build your own Windpower Generator 

Click onto the links below and check out the information on how YOU can make your own homemade wind turbine. Review both of these links and see which project is best for you and make it a family build. Spend time with the family and save money in the end. What could be better than that.

GLOBALGREEN - WindEnergy Basics

We have been harnessing the windenergy for hundreds of years. From old Holland to farms in the United States, windmills have been used for pumping water or grinding grain. Today, the windmill's modern equivalent—a "wind turbine design" - can use the windenergy to generate electricity.

How It Works

Windpower turbines, like windmills, are mounted on a tower to capture the most energy. At 100 feet (30 meters) or more aboveground, they can take advantage of the faster and less turbulent wind. Turbines catch the windenergy with their propeller-like blades. Usually, two or three blades are mounted on a shaft to form a rotor.

A blade acts much like an airplane wing. When the wind blows, a pocket of low-pressure air forms on the downwind side of the blade. The low-pressure air pocket then pulls the blade toward it, causing the rotor to turn. This is called lift. The force of the lift is actually much stronger than the wind's force against the front side of the blade, which is called drag. The combination of lift and drag causes the rotor to spin like a propeller, and the turning shaft spins a generator to make electricity.

Applications

These wind turbines near Lamar, Colorado, are part of the 162-MW Colorado Green Wind Farm. Each turbine produces 1.5 megawatts of electricity.

A Windpower turbine can be used as stand-alone applications, or they can be connected to a utility power grid or even combined with a photovoltaic (solar cell) system. For utility-scale (megawatt-sized) sources of wind energy, a large number of wind turbines are usually built close together to form a wind plant. Several electricity providers today use wind plants to supply power to their customers.

Stand-alone windpower turbines are typically used for water pumping or communications. However, homeowners, farmers, and ranchers in windy areas can also use wind turbines as a way to cut their energy billing.

Small windpower systems also have potential as distributed energy resources. Distributed energy resources refer to a variety of small, modular power-generating technologies that can be combined to improve the operation of the electricity delivery system. 


Getting Started
You can make a homemade wind turbine for windpower generation in your own spare time at home. Makes a great family project that will save money while providing great fun for the family.
Simply click on the links bel;ow and see what project suits your needs and get started today.

GlobalGreen - Linking you to SolarEnergy and WindEnergy harnessing methods.

For solar hot water systems, flat-plate solar collectors are typically installed facing south on a rooftop.

The shallow water of a lake is usually warmer than the deep water. That's because the sunlight can heat the lake bottom in the shallow areas, which in turn, heats the water. It's nature's way of solar water heating. 


The sun can be used in basically the same way to heat water used in buildings and swimming pools.

Most solarenergy water heating systems for buildings have two main parts: a solar collector and a storage tank. The most common collector is called a flat-plate collector. Mounted on the roof, it consists of a thin, flat, rectangular box with a transparent cover that faces the sun. Small tubes run through the box and carry the fluid — either water or other fluid, such as an antifreeze solution — to be heated. The tubes are attached to an absorber plate, which is painted black to absorb the heat. As heat builds up in the solarenergy collector, it heats the fluid passing through the tubes.

The storage tank then holds the hot liquid. It can be just a modified water heater, but it is usually larger and very well-insulated. Systems that use fluids other than water usually heat the water by passing it through a coil of tubing in the tank, which is full of hot fluid.

Solarenergy  water heating systems can be either active or passive, but the most common are active systems. Active systems rely on pumps to move the liquid between the collector and the storage tank, while passive systems rely on gravity and the tendency for water to naturally circulate as it is heated.

Swimming pool systems are simpler. The pool's filter pump is used to pump the water through a solar collector, which is usually made of black plastic or rubber. And of course, the pool stores the hot water.


By review in the links below you will find you can make a "photovoltaic cell" solarenergy system right in your own home and also you will be able to harness the winds energy as well to help you cut or eliminate those energy billings.


Take a moment of your time and read and listen to the information in each of the tutorials and this may be something you and your family may like to try. 


Have fun with the family and save money in the end, doesn't get much better. Check it out and you decide.

GLOBALGREEN - links to SolarEnergy Photovoltaic Technology

Solarenergy cells, also called photovoltaic cells by scientists, convert sunlight directly into electricity. PV gets its name from the process of converting light (photons) to electricity (voltage), which is called the PV effect. The PV effect was discovered in 1954, when scientists at Bell Telephone discovered that silicon (an element found in sand) created an electric charge when exposed to sunlight. Soon solarenergy cells were being used to power space satellites and smaller items like calculators and watches. Today, thousands of people power their homes and businesses with individual solarenergy PV systems. Utility companies are also using PV technology for large power stations.

Solarenergy panels used to power homes and businesses are typically made from solar cells combined into modules that hold about 40 cells. A typical home will use about 10 to 20 solar panels to power the home. The panels are mounted at a fixed angle facing south, or they can be mounted on a tracking device that follows the sun, allowing them to capture the most sunlight. Many solarenergy panels combined together to create one system is called a solar array. For large electric utility or industrial applications, hundreds of solar arrays are interconnected to form a large utility-scale PV system.

A large silicon solar array installed on the roof of a commercial building.

Thin-film solar tiles installed on the roof of a home in Ohio.

A large solar array in Germany.

Traditional solar cells are made from silicon, are usually flat-plate, and generally are the most efficient. Second-generation solarenergy cells are called thin-film solar cells because they are made from amorphous silicon or nonsilicon materials such as cadmium telluride. Thin film solar cells use layers of semiconductor materials only a few micrometers thick. Because of their flexibility, thin film solarenergy cells can double as rooftop shingles and tiles, building facades, or the glazing for skylights.

Third-generation solarenergy cells are being made from variety of new materials besides silicon, including solar inks using conventional printing press technologies, solar dyes, and conductive plastics. Some new solar cells use plastic lenses or mirrors to concentrate sunlight onto a very small piece of high efficiency PV material. The PV material is more expensive, but because so little is needed, these systems are becoming cost effective for use by utilities and industry. However, because the lenses must be pointed at the sun, the use of concentrating collectors is limited to the sunniest parts of the country.


You can easily make the solarenergy photovoltaic cell in the convenience of your own home, by following the simple instructional information provided in the following links. Check it out today and start saving on your energy billing.