What-A-One-Kilowatt-PV-System-Does-In-Eco-Reductions

DID YOU KNOW...

A one kilowatt PV system each month:
Prevents 150 lbs. of coal from being mined
Prevents 300 lbs. of CO 2 from entering the atmosphere
Keeps 105 gallons of water from being consumed
Keeps NO and SO 2 from being released into the environment or an equivalent system that produces 150 kWh per month

It's more than just a luxury, you are helping look after our planet by reducing your carbon footprint whilst living a more sustainable lifestyle.

DIY-Solar-Air-Heater

Make a DIY solar air heater from soda cans for next to nothing.

Pictured above is a simple small passive solar heater made from recycled aluminium drinks cans and used to heat a room.

If the building to be heated is well insultated, a solar heater such as this can lift the temperature by a significant number of degrees. A larger heater or a number of similar heaters can be used to heat larger spaces, or to heat smaller spaces to a higher temperature.Offcuts of 2 x 4 and a sheet of plywood were used to build a box to tightly hold 5 rows of 10 black-painted aluminium drinks cans.

The inside of the box was then sealed using silicone to prevent hot air from escaping.

Cold air is drawn in from a hole at the bottom of the box, and the heated air emerges from the top passing through a pipe into the room to be heated. A perspex sheet was glued to the box to let sunlight in but not let the hot air escape.

Solar-Hot-Water-Wood-Stove-Hybrid-Installation-Schematic

Here is a schematic for a Solar hot water installation coupled with a wood burning stove I recently completed. The existing system was a semi pumped and vented hot water and central heating system.

The old fuel oil boiler was removed and the pipework modified to allow for heating via both Evacuated Solar Tubes and the Wood stove.

The main components were purchased from Navitron

I utilised a retro fit coil heat exchanger to replace the electric immersion heating element. My client is extremely pleased with how the whole system integrates. The whole 5 bed roomed house is heated via the wood stove and the hot water is heated via the evacuated tube solar hot water system and can be boosted via the wood stove.

If you are interested in a free quotation for a similar bespoke solar hot water installation then please do give me a call or drop me an email.

Pictures of the installation to be posted soon.

NanoSolar-Printed-Solar-Cells-Cheapest-In-The-World

NanoSolar Inc - Printing Solar Film

For a number of years I have been watching the development of a Californian based company NanoSolar Inc (Nano Solar Inc). My interest started when I realised that the cost of solar cells were so high it would never become viable for every rooftop to have a solar panel array. I have thought of various ways and means to bring cheap renewable energy to the masses but always strayed back to Solar PV cells.

What they have come up with is a way to print (Screen Print) Solar Substrate straight onto a thin foil material which means no more expensive silicon wafer based panels which are thick, heavy and expensive to produce. The new technology opens up a whole new dimension for end users.

Imagine an all electric vehicle with a Solar PV shell? How about solar slates that are cheaper than roofing tiles? A parking lot for electric vehicles with a solar roof? The new uses are endless!

NanoSolar Inc are fully booked with orders for the next 2 years (Correct as of July 2009) The demand is huge, they are gearing up for more production capacity already!

I would love to see a time when renewable energy can directly compete with fossil derived fuels (Coal, Oil & Gas) I think the Printed Solar Panels are a step in the right direction.

Semiconductor Printing

Printing is by far the simplest, highest-yield, and most capital-efficient technique for depositing thin films. Printing is extremely fast; the equipment involved is easy to use and maintain; and it works in plain air (no vacuum chamber required).

Another key advantage of a printable CIGS ink is that one can print it just where one wants it to be, achieving high materials utilization of the semiconductor material.

Printing is much simpler and more robust than vacuum deposition techniques such as sputtering or evaporation which have conventionally been used to fabricate thin-film solar cells; the process cost of vacuum techniques is so high that the result is not an inexpensive cell relative to the per-square-meter economics that the solar industry requires.

Solar-Panels-For-Shed-Summerhouse-How-To-Calculate

Renewable energy in your shed / workshop / out house / barn / stables or similar.

Below is what you need to know!

How much power do you require?

What you have to look at is how much power you want and for how long per day. Start off by listing everything electrical you are going to be using in your shed, for example:
1 x 600 Watt Power Drill
1 x 60 Watt Light Bulb
1 x 10 Watt Radio

Next thing to do is work out how long per day you are going to be in your shed per day, also whilst you are in your shed, how long are you going to be using each of your electrical appliances. Example below:

2 Hours per day in my shed on average. (Total time per day in Shed)
1 x 600 Watt Power Drill for 1 hour per day.
1 x 60 Watt Light Bulb for 2 Hours per day.
1 x 10 Watt Radio for 2 Hours per day.

Now for the simple math behind it all!

Drill - 600 Watts x 1 Hour = 600 Watt Hours or 0.6 KWA (Kilo Watt Hour)
Light - 60 Watts x 2 hours = 120 Watt Hours or 0.06 KWA (Kilo Watt Hour)
Radio - 10 Watts x 2 Hours = 20 Watt Hours or 0.02 KWA (Kilo Watt Hour)
Total use per day = (0.6 + 0.06 + 0.02) = 0.68 KWA Per Day

My rule of thumb is to double your estimate therefore 0.68 KWA x 2 = 1.36KWA

Calculating your Solar Panel size.

Lets assume that on average a typical location in the UK will receive 5 hours of bright sunshine per day (Wishful thinking I know!) Notice we are working with 2 known quantities now 1. Power (Watts) and time (Hours) this enables us to work out what we need easily.
Take our total load (1.36 KWA) and divide it by sunlight hours (5) = (0.272) This is the figure in KW that are panel will need to provide for 5 hours to enable us to place enough power in our battery bank to let us use our electrical equipment for designated time above (2 Hours per day) 0.272 KWA can be converted into Watts by x 1000 so: 0.272 KWA x 1000 = 272 Watts or a 272 Watt Solar Panel Is required!

Calculating your battery bank size.

We know from our calculation's above that our electricity demand is 1.36 KWA worst case, so our battery bank is required to put out a minimum of 1.36 KW for 1 hour (KWH) If we are going to use a 12 V (Volt) battery bank then we can start looking at the figures:
We know we need 1360 Watts for one hour.
We know we have 12 Volts DC from the battery bank.
Ohms Law states that P (Watts) = I (Current In Amps) x V (Volts)
So we have 1360 (Watts) = ? (I - Current In Amps) x 12 (Volts)
So without boring you too much if we divide 1360 by 12 We get 113.33 Amps!

Batteries are measured in AH (Ampere Hours) But note that the specified AH on a battery is normally measured over a 10 hour period so the drain on a measured AH is 1/10th over 10 hours!
Lets assume for our rule of thumb and to be sure we are going to double our needs so we require 113.33 * 2 = 226.66 AH (Amp Hour) at 12VDC. Easy!

Calculating Your Inverter Size.

(The thing that takes battery DC and makes domestic AC for use with household electrical equipment!
We know that we are going to be using a 12V DC battery bank to power the inverter so we know we require a 12V DC inverter!
We know we require a Max of 1360 Watts or 1.36 KW of power and lets factor in 100% to allow for losses and inefficiencies, this gives us 2.72KW.
So We would choose a 12V DC inverter at 3000 Watts or 3 KW.

Choosing a Solar Charge Controller.

There are many different kinds of solar charge controllers available in the current market, PWM controllers (Pulse Width Modulation Controllers) Electronic controllers and MPPT (Maximum Point Power Tracker) to keep this section simple you are best sending me an EMAIL with info on what you are wanting to do and I will suggest the best solution for your needs.

If you want more information please do EMAIL me and I will provide you with a free quotation for either supply only or supply & installation.

Renewable-Energy-Types-And-Uses

Types Of Feasible renewable energy for domestic homes.

Below are the types of renewable energy groups that can be implemented into a domestic home.

Solar Panels: Domestic Grid Tied.

Solar panels are NOT a cheap option but are a low maintenance option for anyone considering using renewable energy to supply part of their electricity needs at home. To give you an idea of costs associated with a solar PV installation then budget on £6.00 per watt of installed solar, considering you will need (for a three bed roomed typical family home) something like 3000 Watts of solar panels on the roof to give you electricity for free (Most of the time - On Average) then you are looking at an £18,000.00 investment with a typical payback time of 15 to 25 years!

Solar Panels: Remote Building / Shed / Workshop / Hobby Shop.

I would recommend Solar PV panels for a remote type building where you only require a small amount of electricity, i.e. Low energy CF lighting / domestic sockets for laptops / low energy appliances etc. The great thing about remote power is you have the solar panel connected to a battery bank via a charge controller which looks after the batteries and keeps them charged and ready for use. From the battery bank you have an inverter to convert the batteries power into domestic 230VAC (Volts Alternating Current)

Solar Hot Water Panels: Domestic Use.

There are 2 main types of solar hot water panels 1. Flat plate collectors 2.Evacuated tubes collectors. There is much debate over which technology is the best and I am not going to go into the 'for and against' argument here but in my opinion if you are here to look for the best way of reducing your gas or electricity bills then installing Solar Hot Water panels is the way to go. In the UK we could produce at least 70% of all our hot water requirements from the sun that shines on our house roofs! That is one big saving for the average UK home. If you think that you might pay £3,000.00 for a simple solar hot water installation and your hot water heating bill comes down by 70% then the payback time for the installation is not too far away!

Wind Turbines: Domestic Grid Tied.

Wind turbines mounted on the side of your house are one way to reduce your electricity bills considerably. When you hear the phrase 'Grid Tied' all it means is that the electricity the wind turbine produces is pushed back in to the electricity network grid, in effect if the wind turbine is producing electricity in excess of what you are using then your meter will run backwards lowering your electricity bill. This is one way to save money but when the grid goes down (In the event of a power cut) your grid tied wind turbine automatically disconnects from the grid so you have no power! Great for energy saving, no good at all if you want to keep on using power in the event of the national grid shutting down (Power Cut).

Wind Turbines: Off-Grid Power / Remote Power / Shed Power / Workshop Power.

If you require power away from the electricity supply then a wind turbine is a great option. They typically output 12VDC or 24VDC and can be used to charge a battery bank for later use via an inverter. They are much cheaper than Solar PV but you must remember that the wind does not blow all the time so you may want to consider combining a wind turbine with some solar panels.

Solar-Cookers

Solar Cookers or Solar Ovens are very simple, easy to build cookers that use the power of the sun to cook food.

Open fire wood cooking is a huge problem in developing and poor countries. Cooking in a poorly ventilated kitchen on an open fire can cause respiratory diseases and premature death over time. Many poor countries are in hot climates where the population receive many hours of bright daylight for much of the day. Solar cookers are a simple, clean, environmentally responsible way of cooking hot vegetables and meat.

The principle is simple enough. Create a box or enclosure with an open top that is well insulated and has a reflective / mirrored finish on the inside of the container. Inside you place a blackened / very dark, non reflective pot with your raw vegetables and meat in and finally place a clear (Glass / PVC) lid on the top and pop the box in bright sunshine until your food is thoroughly cooked.

More reflective shutters can be added to direct more sunshine into your solar cooker for better results. The preferred material for the reflected surface is Mylar or Melinex but can be substituted with tinfoil, turkey foil or polished stainless steel.

Notes on Mylar: DIY Solar Cooker enthusiasts usually utilize Mylar as it claims a 65% reflectivity.

Something I have recently come across is Diamond Reflective Mylar that claims a 99% reflectivity, how true this claim is I have no data on but I am going to be building and documenting 2 solar cookers and comparing the efficiencies to see what benefit there is using Diamond Mylar over traditional Reflective Mylar.

External Website Links


http://solarcookers.org/
Read and purchase Solar Cookers / Solar Ovens

http://solarcookers.org/basics/how.html
The basics on Solar Cookers / Solar Ovens

http://solarcooking.org/
Large website for Solar Cooking

http://www.sunspot.org.uk/ed/
Fresnel Lense Solar Cooking

http://journeytoforever.org/sc.html
Journey To Forever's slant on Solar Cooking

http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Cooking/cooking.htm
Build It Solar provides some interesting information

Sunshine-To-Solar-Help

Solar collectors (solar panels) mounted on a roof are connected to pipes containing a heating fluid mixture of water and antifreeze. When the sun heats up the solar collectors the hot fluid is pumped through the pipes to a heat exchange coil in the new solar hot water cylinder. Here the captured solar energy is transferred from the hot fluid in the coil to the household's hot water supply. The hot water in the cylinder is connected to the taps, shower, washing machine, etc in the usual way.

In order for the solar water heating system to run safely and efficiently, a range of valves are installed in the heating fluid circuit. A series of temperature sensors are connected to a digital solar controller to switch the system on or off according to the solar energy available.
On days of limited sunlight, solar energy alone may not be sufficient to heat the household's water to a usable temperature. In this case your conventional boiler or your immersion heater (if fitted) can be used to further boost the temperature of the solar heated water.
choosing the right system

As with all technologies there are good and not so good solar water heating systems. When choosing a solar water heating system there are a number of points to consider:

Hot water storage cylinder
The size of the hot water storage cylinder is generally determined by the amount of hot water your household uses in a day.

Typical daily hot water usage:

Volume In Litres (litres)

Standard sized bath
60
Corner bath
120
Shower / Power shower
15-60
Washing machine
50
Kitchen sink
15
Bathroom washbasin
5

A new solar hot water storage cylinder is usually fitted in the airing cupboard replacing your existing storage cylinder. If the space around your existing storage cylinder is limited an alternative position or design can normally be agreed.

Size and quantity of solar collectors
Allow around one square meter of collector surface area for every 45 - 50 litres of hot water to be stored.

Position of solar collector
Collectors in the UK work best when facing south and at an angle of around 35 degrees from the horizontal.
Durability
A well designed and constructed solar water heating system should provide many years of good service with little maintenance.

Cost
Assuming a life span in excess of 20 years, solar water heating offers good value for money when comparing the initial investment to the cost of a household's current heating fuels. The costs of conventional heating may increase over the years as existing oil and gas supplies diminish and 'pollution taxes' are levied.

It is also important to consider the cost of electricity to run the solar heating system (pump, controls etc). For a typical home this is less than £5 per year.
Solar water heating cannot be considered good value if the initial system cost is too expensive. For this reason it is important to shop around for a competitively priced system using high quality components.

Welcome-To-Renewable-Energy-UK-www.homebrewpower.co.uk

HomeBrewPower Project Mission Statement:

HomeBrewPower is dedicated to providing interesting projects, reviews and case studies for Renewable Energy Projects. Many renewable energy projects can be applied to homes and businesses. Wind Turbines are a great DIY project to start off with for producing some of your electrical needs. Of course some may want to learn about Solar Hot Water, Micro-Hydro turbines, Geothermal Heating, Energy Saving or running your Diesel Car on 'Carbon Neutral' Waste Vegetable Oil (WVO) We are constantly updating each and every page and adding new ones all the time here at HomeBrewPower, check back regularly to see what we are working on.

HomeBrewPower Installation Services:

Specializing in the design & installation of UK Off-Grid power for Remote homes, buildings & boats. Systems include Solar PV, Wind Turbines, Micro CHP & Solar Hot Water. 12, 24 36, 48 & 230V Systems tailored to suit the clients power requirements.

We like to work on bespoke / one off domestic living spaces such as: Woodland Low Impact Houses, Eco Houses, Boat Homes, Isolated Properties, Custom Built Homes, Yurts, Dome Houses, Straw Bail Homes, Reclaimed Building Material Homes. Anything that requires all the creature comforts of a traditionally built home but without the restraints of Grid-Tied Electricity.

If you are looking for either a complete package or just a helping hand. design or advice

then please contact us by clicking here

Our areas of expertise are listed below

Solar PV Installations
Wind Turbine Installations
12VDC Installations
Micro-Hydro Installations
230VAC Off Grid Installations
Energy Saving Lighting Installations
Carbon Neutral Energy Points (Small solar setup to provide power to 1 of more sockets at home)
Eco Product Reviews
Eco Evaluations

HomeBrewPower-Renewable-Energy-Projects-Tips-Help

Renewable Energy UK | Visit Our Home Brew Power Website

Wind | Domestic Wind Turbines - Good Or Bad?

Solar | Solar Panels For Your Shed Or Summerhouse?

Carbon Neutral | Recent Posts Relating To 'Carbon Neutral'

Babington Burner | Purchase Our Hand Made WVO Burning Babington Nozzles

HomeBrewPower Yahoo Group On Carbon Neutral Power Generation

Church-Powered-By-The-Heavens-Well-The-Sun

Church powered by the heavens

A Methodist church just outside Shrewsbury has become the first in the West Midlands to install a solar panel.

In their efforts to do their bit for the environment, the congregation at Bayston Hill, assisted by the Marches Energy Agency, have already been replacing old-fashioned light bulbs with low energy ones, recycling and promoting fair trade.

Now, they have moved one step further - capturing the sun's rays through the new thermal panel on the roof to provide hot water in the church.

Marches Energy Agency identified the church as suitable for a solar thermal system during an energy audit this year.

Although the technology has huge potential to reduce the fossil fuel demand and carbon footprint of a building, installations in the UK are still small.

"Many people think that because we get less sun than some other countries, a panel won't supply much hot water, especially in the colder months," said the agency's Katherine Shepherd.

"But, even in winter, a panel can contribute 20% to a household's hot water demand and 100% in summer - around 50% across the year. It is also a great example of action on climate change. Bayston Hill's Methodists are to be congratulated on their initiative."

The minister, Reverend Frances Bisker, said: "A solar thermal system has got everyone thinking and talking about climate change, not only in the church but also in the local community. We are thrilled to be one of the first churches - and hopefully the first of many - in the country."

The panel was installed with the help of Marches Energy Agency (www.mea.org.uk) and its Project Carbon team (www.projectcarbon.org). Funding was from Defra's Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund - managed locally by Shropshire County Council.

Information on solar thermal technology and the grants available to households and community buildings is available from the Low Carbon Buildings Programme www.lowcarbonbuildings.org.uk

Off-Grid-Solar-PV-Project-UK

Project;Wood Forge Off-Grid Power To Remote Forge.

Home Brew Power comes across many bespoke projects in the alternative / renewable power generation business. Odian Wood Forge in Kent is a fine example worth a mention.

We are providing a solar setup to supply the forge with single phase 230VAC power to feed the extractor fan and forge fan motor. the Solar PV panel will charge a bank of SLA batteries via a charge controller which in turn powers a PSW (Pure Sine Wave) inverter. The system has been designed to allow additional sources of power to be added, if required, in the future.

The forge will be in use approximately 4 hours per week. The remainder of the time the autonomous RE (Renewable Energy) system will replenish the batteries.

Googleplex-Solar-PV-How-It-Should-Be-Done

Google Leading The Way To A Sustainable Future

Location:Mountain View, California
System Size:1.6 MW

Energy Output:2,611,719 kWh per year
Savings:$393,000 + annually

Results:CO2 emissions reduced by 3.6 million pounds/year (equivalent to 4.28 million car miles/year)

"At Google, we do things a bit differently. We see a bit of ourselves in the way that EI Solutions solves problems, thinks, and invents."

Robyn Beavers, Corporate Environmental Programs

Background As one of the most recognizable brands on the Internet, Google is on a mission to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Like many of today's high-tech companies, Google requires an enormous amount of electricity to power the computers and servers it uses to run its business.

The company wanted to find a way to reduce energy costs at its Mountain View "Googleplex," as well as make a statement in support of clean energy.

The ChallengeUnlike the typical "big box" buildings found on most high-tech campuses, Google headquarters features structures with unique configurations, sharp angles, and other architecturally unusual design elements.

The Smart Solution: Intelligent use of available mounting surfacesBecause of the nontraditional design of the Google buildings, the EI Solutions team had to take a nontraditional approach to engineering the company's solar power system. To maximize energy output, the team assessed every available surface on the Google campus for its viability to hold solar photovoltaic (PV) cells. Eventually, more than 197,000 square feet on top of existing buildings and new parking lot shade structures (designed especially for the project) were fitted with cells using customized mounting hardware.

To help reduce the cost of such a large installation, plus simplify any future maintenance needs, EI Solutions used one type of PV module in all arrays.To further optimize the Google system, EI Solutions also closely examined the company's electricity usage patterns, available financial incentives, and the amount of sun received at its Mountain View headquarters.
The Result, By building the largest solar power system ever installed at a single corporate campus, Google will save more than $393,000 annually in energy costs — or close to $15 million over the 30-year lifespan of its solar system. At this rate, the system will pay for itself in approximately 7.5 years.

Breif-Explanation-Of-Alternative-Power-Sources

The majority of the electrical power used throughout the world is produced by generators containing a rotating magnet usually powered by steam created from burning fossil fules. Renewable sources of energy, however , are becoming more commonly used across the globe. The government has set a target to generate 10% of the UK's electricity needs from renewable sources by the year 2010.

Alternative energy sources include solar panels, wind generators, hydro-electric power and nuclear power. Solar panels convert sunlight directly to electricity but in general have low efficiency. Wind power is used directly to rotate turbines to generate electricity. Hydro-electric power converts the kinetic energy from falling water into electricity and nuclear power uses the energy locked in the nuclei of atoms instead of fossil fuels.

Hologram-Prism-Solar-Panels-By-Prism-Solar-Technologies

The main limitation of solar power right now is cost, because the crystalline silicon used to make most solar photovoltaic (PV) cells is very expensive. One approach to overcoming this cost factor is to concentrate light from the sun using mirrors or lenses, thereby reducing the total area of silicon needed to produce a given amount of electricity.

But traditional light concentrators are bulky and unattractive -- less than ideal for use on suburban rooftops.

Now Prism Solar Technologies of Stone Ridge, NY, has developed a proof-of-concept solar module that uses holograms to concentrate light, possibly cutting the cost of solar modules by as much as 75 percent, making them competitive with electricity generated from fossil fuels.
The new technology replaces unsightly concentrators with sleek flat panels laminated with holograms. The panels, says Rick Lewandowski, the company's president and CEO, are a "more elegant solution" to traditional concentrators, and can be installed on rooftops -- or even incorporated into windows and glass doors.

The system needs 25 to 85 percent less silicon than a crystalline silicon panel of comparable wattage, Lewandowski says, because the photovoltaic material need not cover the entire surface of a solar panel. Instead, the PV material is arranged in several rows. A layer of holograms -- laser-created patterns that diffract light -- directs light into a layer of glass where it continues to reflect off the inside surface of the glass until it finds its way to one of the strips of PV silicon. Reducing the PV material needed could bring down costs from about $4 per watt to $1.50 for crystalline silicon panels, he says.

The company is expecting to pull in another $6 million from interested venture capitalists and start manufacturing its first-generation modules by the end of the year, selling them at about $2.40 per watt. Next-generation modules with more advanced technology should bring down the cost further.

In their ability to concentrate light, holograms are not as powerful as conventional concentrators. They can multiply the amount of light falling on the cells only by as much as a factor of 10, whereas lens-based systems can increase light by a factor of 100, and some even up to 1,000.

Googleplex-Goes-Solar

Google Enters the Energy Business

I read on the Google blog that they plan to begin installation of 1.6 megawatts of solar photovoltaic panels (PV panels) at their Head Office in Mountain View, California. They reckon it will be ‘the largest solar installation on any corporate campus in the U.S., and think it’s one of the largest on any corporate site in the world’. But something puzzled me – do they have enough room for all those panels?
Apparently ‘The panels will cover the roofs of the four main buildings of the Googleplex, and also those of two additional buildings across the street. There will also be a portion of this installation on new solar panel support structures in a few parking lots. The amount of electricity that will be generated is equivalent to powering about 2,000 UK or 1,000 average California homes. 'We’ll use that electricity to power several of our Mountain View office facilities, offsetting approximately 30% of our peak electricity consumption at those buildings.’

You can see how much roof space they have available in this photograph I came across (from Google Earth). So I looked into how much space you’d need to generate 1.6 megawatts from solar PV panels. According to one set of calculations I found on a mail order PV panel site ‘Solar Solar’, Google are going to need 919 PV modules generating 185 watts each. This will cover 13,250 square feet or one third of an acre. The campus covers 22 acres, so it would seem that giving up 1.36% of that space in roofing and parking isn’t such a big deal.
For you or I the cost of 919 PV panels would be anything from £0.5 million to £5 million. For some reason prices in the UK are at the higher end. Luckily for Google, the California Energy Commission has a very good rebate system for homes and businesses, particularly if Google use a ‘Grid tie’ system – putting electricity into the grid during the day when the sun’s out (so the meter goes backwards) and drawing it back at night on an off peak or reduced rate. So it seems Google may now technically be entering the energy market. Googlejuice! Googlegreen!
I dare say it won’t be too long before we can see something demonstrating how many greenhouse emissions have been saved by Google’s solar move - like this one at the Hydrogen Fuel Cell Institute.