Alternative Energy

What Are Solar Energy Systems?

Imagine being able to completely offset the cost of your electricity bills. Never again do you have to pay for electric energy. Instead, people are now able to generate their own electricity entirely through the use of solar energy systems. A solar energy system would make a great addition to your household. The ability to produce electricity for free is certainly enticing, isn’t it?

Thousands of people before you have made the jump into using solar energy for all of their electricity needs. Your home could benefit from a solar energy system and it would save you thousands every year.

In order to get the most rays from the sun, most solar energy systems will have panels that go directly onto your roof. Roof setups are the most effective way to use a solar panel set up because it has the most exposure to the sun. People who own homes aren’t the only ones who are taking advantage of solar energy systems. Big companies are also using them, connecting an immense number of solar panels to the roofs of their company buildings.Continue reading

16 reasons why the sun should be your valentine

Alternative Energy

Love is in the air…ah. Valentine ’s Day is a great reminder to let the people we care about know how we feel. As we run from store to store collecting chocolates, flowers, and cards, we thought this holiday would be a great opportunity to profess our love for the sun.

Unfortunately, our sonnet writing skills would make William Shakespeare roll in his grave. Instead, we decided to create a list of all the reasons that the sun should be your Valentine this year. The best part, you don’t have to spend a dime to show your affection for it when you lease your solar home installation.

Solar Panels for Your Home

Alternative Energy , Energy , Green Living

Getting solar panels for your home can dramatically affect your electricity bill. If you are used to paying hundreds or thousands of dollars per year for your electricity bill, be prepared to pay much less. You can offset the cost of electricity or even eliminate your bill altogether through the use of solar panels. The most popular set up for solar panels is having the panels attached to the roof. This gives the panels the biggest coverage area and exposes them to the most rays of the sun.

What kind of money can you expect to save? Your average solar panel system will save you around 50 dollars per month on your electricity bill. If you get a bigger system, one that’s designed to take on the full force of your electrical needs, you can expect to eliminate your electricity bill altogether. Incredible!

Wind generator power rating missing the point

Alternative Energy

With the push to go green, also in micro markets, much has been made of wind power. Media outlets attentive to the wind energy development have focused attention on the industry and many homeowners have followed suit.

The emergence of many upstart wind companies has advertisers scrambling to gain the attention of would-be consumers in a relatively new market. To this point, advertising has focused mostly on a maximum “output figure.” This to a certain extent has confused consumers, many of which being new to wind energy.

To further confuse matters most companies are purposefully inflating these figures in an apparently deliberate attempt to mislead consumers. In our opinion, the maximum output figures of a wind generator most people are focusing on does very little to describe the efficiency of a particular unit.

That figure does little to relay a conceptual idea to the customer that is useful in making a decision on purchasing a wind generator. Maximum output figures of wind generators in many cases give a snapshot of an expected output at a given moment at the peak of a power curve.

Sustainability – Solar Energy

Alternative Energy

Solar Is Beating Fossil Fuels

Sometimes it gets a little frustrating to hear opponents of solar energy say continuously that sustainable energy is not ready to be competitive with fossil fuels to deliver all the power our country requires. Well, I know that the solar sector is expanding enormously year after year and that fossil fuels keep on being eliminated.

The solar industry has long ago left behind the cottage industry mentality it had decades ago. Spectacular developments in production technology and funding have helped bring the solar industry to the playing field with coal, oil, natural gas, and nuclear power. Here are some reasons why solar is already succeeding in beating fossil fuels.

Green solution for your home

Alternative Energy

The ability to control consumption of electric power, though, may have the biggest impact. One approach is to let utility companies (with the homeowner’s consent, of course) cut back heating or air conditioning, or turn off other equipment, during power emergencies, either over the public Internet or through a direct connection to the utility company’s data network. In compensation, homeowners might receive discounts on their monthly electricity bills.

Or, in a more imaginative scenario, the appliances could regulate themselves as the utility company varies the cost of electricity from day to day or even hour to hour. Either way, the potential for energy saving is substantial.

It’s already starting to happen overseas. Italy’s Enel, the largest publicly traded utility company in the world, expects this year to begin wiring the 27 million homes it serves to allow such remote demand management and other services, using equipment supplied by Echelon, a Sunnyvale, Calif., supplier of building automation equipment and software.

Renewable Resources

Alternative Energy

Renewable energy comes from sources that may be continuously renewed by nature. Consequently, we will never be running out of these energy sources, that is, for as long the Sun’s nuclear fusion processes continue to provide the Earth with energy.

Here are a few examples:

Solar Power: Solar power is seen as renewable energy as expectations are that nuclear fusion processes that are powering the Sun will continue to generate sunlight for billions of years.

We are capturing the light of the Sun to:

Drive steam turbines to produce electricity (the concentration of Solar Power),
Heat homes (via so-called Passive Solar Design or via an Active Solar Heating System),
Make hot water (via an Active or Passive Solar Hot Water System),
Cook (on a Solar Oven),
Distill water
Generate electricity by using solar electric (or photovoltaic) cells

Understanding Global Warming

Alternative Energy

The most debated topic on earth is the issue of climate change. This a universally accepted statement. The system of the seasons is changing, and climatic conditions have become unpredictable.

Nonseasonal rains are being experienced, the earth is getting warmer, glaciers are melting down, and the sea levels are rising. Fertile lands are becoming infertile and diseases are spreading, some fear that life as we know it will be ending soon, just imagine what actions must be taken now to save our planet for next generations.

Who do you think is the culprit of these current situations? Well, in fact, it is us, as we are all humans, aren’t we? It is our own activities that have resulted in the current situation.

So the following questions might come to everybody’s mind:

1. What is it that we have done?
2. What are the effects on our environment?
3. How do environmental changes relate to Climate Change?
4. Can we do anything about it?

To answer the above questions, we need to identify and understand the causes, says Ales Rades from MyCareerTools.com. This will help people appreciate the real problem and allows us to work on solutions.Continue reading

Cheap and Easy Ways to Use Solar Energy

Alternative Energy

Harnessing the sun’s energy makes sense because it is clean, green, and saves money in the long run. But the reality is that the cost involved with installing panels and collectors is still out of reach for the vast majority of homeowners. Fortunately, there are some cheap and easy ways to make the sun work for you.

Passive Solar
Passive solar means simply using or blocking the sun’s rays to heat or cool your home. This means that using your window coverings wisely can save you a ton on your power bills. Simply closing or angling your blinds to keep direct sunlight out can drop the interior temperature by 10 degrees. Try closing the window coverings on the south side of your house when you leave for the day during the summer months.

Without the sun’s hot light shining in the windows, your air conditioner won’t have to work as hard. And in the winter, of course, doing the opposite can help heat your house. There tons of great looking blinds, awnings, and window films to help you harness or block the sun’s powerful rays.

How Will Solar PV Businesses Benefit From The New Incentives?

Alternative Energy

The Claymore MAC Global Solar Energy Index ETF, TAN, had fallen 78% over the past years, but they’re back. Most listed solar companies had fallen from 50% to 87% over that period, but a bright spark, however, was the passed economic stimulus bill which started boosting demand once again. With the extension of the Federal 30% tax credit and the removal of the $2000 cap, homeowners will see the price of solar PV get much more affordable.

And, for commercial developers of solar facilities, the new bill has provisions that would allow them to take the 30% tax credit as a grant instead. Some of the companies best positioned to ride out the challenges of this year are the big market-leading companies with adequate cash in hand. US manufacturer First Solar is one of these companies.

1 2 Next »

Category Archives for "Alternative Energy"