Renewable Energy – Facts About Solar Energy
Solar panels installed on your roof will provide you with plenty of hot water. For city dwellers, a small, meter wide wind turbine unobtrusively placed on your roof could provide enough energy to run a laptop computer, a TV, lights and even a music system. Solar energy being the most abundant and almost infinite it is the most obvious source to make use of. Since solar technology does not rely on the sunlight itself but on solar radiation, it can work efficiently in the UK to provide up to 70% of typical annual domestic hot water requirements. Solar energy platforms offer benefits to even the most isolated communities, bringing lighting, communication and economic productivity.
Passive residential solar technologies involve the natural transfer (by radiation, convection and conduction) of solar energy without the use of mechanical devices.
Wind and Solar power is freedom from the greedy oil companies. Hydrogen is the new oil and will be sold by, guess who? the oil companies. Wind and solar power is the perfect solution, why not build your own power plant and supply your family with free, renewable energy? It is popular in countries like India and Pakistan where large rural areas are without power plants and extensive transmission systems. Some European countries are also satisfied customers.
Wind energy is underutilized, solar energy likewise. We barely utilize tide energy at all, let alone wave energy, biomass, “ocean thermal gradients”, or “DAMATOL”, which is a way to harness energy from the natural tendency of waves in the Pacific to curve around a circular structure. Wind turbine utilization in Colorado averages 31%. The vast majority of the time, there is insufficient wind to generate electricity, which means that reliable power sources must be built to “back up” intermittent wind power. Windmills, both large and small have proven to be extremely effective at producing large amounts of cheap electricity. When used on a smaller home-based scale, they can actually, very often, completely replace conventional power sources. Nature is the best acquaintance you can have. Preserve our nature and future with renewable energy.
Electric vehicles are (just as their fueled counterparts) very flexible in their charging intervals. The car can be charged at a lower rate when sufficient renewable power is available. Electricity is produced with the help of a solar power system. Electrical and building design engineers could come up with an innovative way to make it work. Specially designed buffer/insulation and transformer materials could be used to safely capture and harness the massive amounts of electricity generated during a lighting strike, and transfer it to large storage device for later use.
Renewable
Renewable energy sources such as wind power and solar power are growing by 20-30% every year. In 2003, the cumulative installed capacity of solar photovoltaic (PV) systems around the world passed the landmark figure of 2,400 Megawatts of solar photovoltaic power. Renewables HAVE to be our first priority. Renewable fuels provided 18% of the world’s total electricity supply in 2004, according to figures from the International Energy Agency, a Paris-based intergovernmental organization. Almost all of that, though, came from hydropower, a source with limited growth potential because of geographic constraints.
Climate
Oil prices are at record levels and global warming is the most serious environmental challenge facing us today. However, neither our nation nor the world has developed adequate responses to the energy challenges of the future. Climate Change is of course a global phenomenon and therefore requires global action. It manifests itself through, increasingly severe weather events, such as, the recent flooding in Calderdale. It also threatens to melt the polar ice caps, raise sea levels and cause extreme weather like severe droughts, storms and floods – some of which we are already seeing.