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Solar water heaters, also called solar domestic hot water systems, is a cost-effective way to generate hot water for your home. Solar water heaters (solar domestic hot water systems) can be used in any climate, but different types of solar water heaters work best in different areas, and they use free sunshine. This will cut your bill for electricity.

Solar water heater includes two main parts: storage tanks and solar collectors. There are active solar water heating systems and passive solar water heating systems. The active ones have circulating pumps and controls, but the passive solar water heating systems don't. In fact there are many suppliers of solar water heaters in China. They perform differently mainly because of this.

The sales of solar power panel were 5.6GW in 2008, which is up 48 percent. In 2008 3.3GW or 60% solar panel sales was produced in Asia. And about 1.5GW solar energy panel sales was produced in Europe. Only 750MW solar power panel sales was produced in the United States.

 

The downturn of alternative energy (green energy, renewable power) happened in 2009, and the manufacturing capacity utilisation was below 50%, which is similar to the semiconductor-for-IT industry. But in 2010 the solar panel market is picking up again

There's one revolutionary advancement for the development of solar energy. Caltech (California Institute of Technology) researchers claim they have developed a solar cell that is twice as efficient as conventional solar wafers and that could be much cheaper to make.

Using silicon-wire arrays, Caltech researchers claim they can trap up to 96 percent of incident sunlight at a single wavelength and up to 85 per cent of the collectible sunlight, then convert between 90 and 100 percent of it into electrons, aka electricity, surpassing previous optical microstructures developed to trap light. As we know conventional photovoltaic (PV) cells convert about 40% of the sunlight they absorb into electricity.

Solar energy is a kind of cheap energy source for Africa, clean, green, free, without pollution or damage to the environment.

Electrifying the rural areas poses great challenges for African governments. Remote and scattered, rural homes, which are unlike homes in the urban areas, are costly and often impractical to connect to the main electricity grid. But stand-alone sources of power, such as solar energy, wind energy and power from mini-hydro generators, can help to fill the gap of remote and scattered, rural homes. In Africa solar power, which is clean and renewable, fits the demands.

The sun is free and inexhaustible.

Home solar power systems (residential solar energy systems) are not as hard to set-up as in a commercial or industrial setting. Generally a home solar power system (residential solar energy systems) can handle about 60% to 80% of household electricity needs.

In fact we don't have to be an engineer to build this home solar power system. Homeowners can develop their own solar energy system at home by following a few guidelines from a book about this. Setting-up a home solar power system may require a couple of solar panels of photovoltaic cells and a rigged system that includes wiring, an inverter, distributor and storage batteries.

Nowadays more and more home solar energy systems (residential solar power systems) are used in our life. Although solar energy is green and eco-friendly, there are still some questions before applying these systems.

What do I want this home solar energy system to do?

Will the home solar power system you build or have installed act as a backup power source only?

Or do you expect to be able to use your home solar energy system to meet all of your energy needs, which include the home heating, hot water, lighting and the running of all your appliances?

Residential solar panels are meant for residential (home use) rather than commercial. With the use of residential solar panels, we can benefit from both indoor and outdoor lighting, backup power, solar water heater, water pumps, pool heaters, and covers to utilize the solar energy (solar power) in the best possible way.

Get the best residential solar panels and save yourself from the inflated energy bills, such as electricity bills. Make sure you conserve the environment by harnessing renewable energies (green energies), reducing the green house effect and global warming.

Some of the major advantages of residential solar panels include:

Solar cells are noise free. So they do not cause noise pollution. No need to worry about noice caused by solar panels.

Solar energy (solar power) harnessed by residential solar panels is non-polluting in nature. Unlike oil that leads to carbon-di-oxide and other carcinogens into air and other traditional power, solar energy cells are eco-friendly.

Solar cells require minimal maintenance by us.

Good passive solar design will provide enough sunlight into the rooms to be absorbed by the surrounding thermal mass (usually masonry materials). So that the heat will be given back into the room when the sun goes down. In fact the thermal mass is a kind of "heat battery" that stores the warmth, absorbing the warmth to keep the room from getting too hot during the day.

The graph demonstrate the process of heat with the sun for you:

And equally important to thermal mass is insulation, such as straw bales or crushed volcanic rock. Insulation will keep that heat inside.

There are two main forms of solar systems for residential use: the "grid-tie" home solar power system, and the "off-grid" or stand-alone home solar power system.

In a grid-tie home solar energy system, a home has solar cells. And the home is still connected to the local power grid. The home solar power system includes solar cells installed on or near a home that collect the sun's energy and convert it into DC electricity. Then the inverter converts the DC power into AC power, which can then be used directly in your green home.