Can solar power panels installed at home provide enough electricity to power my household appliances and heat my water?
Indeed they can, but it will takes a lot of panels. A home averages about 1 kw power. Peak power is higher (3-6 kw) but you can handle that with load leveling storage batteries.
The total maximum solar flux is about 1 kw/square yard (or square meter). Solar panels are around 10% efficient. Because the Sun travels across the sky, the overall power is about half this maximum but then only during the day (only for half the time). Since you will have to recharge your batteries for night time, etc. and battery charging is about 50% you lose another factor of two.
So, assuming the Sun shines every day, you can power your house on 80 square yards (700 square feet of solar panels). This is still very rare because the investment in solar panels, batteries, converters, etc. would have to far outweigh what you are currently spending for commercial electricity.
10 responses to Can solar panels power my household appliances?
Yes it can be, In this modern era, the photovoltaic cells, Solar panels are widely used for various applications. Like Pressure Cooker, Water Heater, Lighting purpose and all other basic things, More over Solar Powered cars under trails, Satellites in the orbits use the same technology for power.
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They can but it takes a lot of panels. A home averages about 1 kw power. Peak power is higher (3-6 kw) but you can handle that with load leveling storage batteries.
The total maximum solar flux is about 1 kw/square yard (or square meter). Solar panels are around 10% efficient. Because the Sun travels across the sky, the overall power is about 1/2 this maximum but then ony during the day (1/2 the time). Since you need to recharge your batteries for nighttime, etc. and battery charging is about 50% you lose abother factor of two.
So, assuming the Sun shines every day, you can power your house on 80 square yards (700 square feet of solar panels). This is still very rare because the investment in solar panels, batteries, converters, etc. far outweighs what you spend for commercial electricity.
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It will take about $44,000 to put enough solar panels to provide the same amount of power that you now have coming from a 220 v 100 amp power line to your house. You should also realize that you need some method of storage for use at night or dark days. This will add another $7,000 to the cost.
The only real solution for the energy problem is nuclear power.
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Yes, but people usually balk at the cost. Right now, the photoelectric materials are rather expensive. So, most people figure it is not worth spending thousands of dollars and will gladly pay hundreds of dollars a month to the electric company. Most estimates are that it takes at least a year and a half to two years to recover the cost of the panels by how much one can save on their electric bill. Most persons would rather pay out that money in little increments to the electric company instead of all at once when having their home built.
Just a side note of trivia: The ability of certain materials to turn photons of light into electric current or the photoelectric effect is what Einstein was awarded his Nobel Prize for, not Relativity.
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ya
u gotta calculate your power load, and install panels and batteries accordingly. there can be no universal solution as sunlight availability differs from place to place.
Better consult a professional.
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This is an interesting way of calculating how many solar panels you need to run your appliances, starting with how much solar energy hits a square meter of ground.
Wouldn’t it be easier to look at what solar panels are available on the market and calculate from there? For example, if you want to generate 1,000 Watts of power, you’d need slightly more than that in panel capacity (to account for efficiency losses across the wiring). Let’s say 30% more. So you need 1,300 Watts of power. Solar panel prices are dropping. A friend just priced some at $2 per watt, wholesale (of course, they weren’t UL listed). Figure $5 a Watt, retail. That’s $6,500 of solar panels.
That doesn’t count installation costs, which includes racks to hold the panels and any wiring.
The payback time on this is going to be a lot more than just a year and a half, as one person commented.
.-= Andy´s last blog ..What can the new Sanyo portable solar panel do? =-.
Is it possable to buy a solar panel that you can put in your window and comes with everything you need to charge up a battery and so on and a socket to plug in a house hold appliance ?
hi i need to knw that, if i need to run an airconditioned of 1500 watts the panels of how many watts i needed and if i add fridge as well than how many more panels i need to run both appliances!!!
I see a lot of negativity around solar power because people expect too much from it and don’t know how to manage it. For instance it is not practical to heat your water through an electric solar system, when sunlight does such an amazing job directly. Heating the home and water must be done by a separate system using the sun’s heat, not converted electricity. Secondly, you only need about 3 kilowatts of electricity to run an average household. A square meter of sunlight produces 1.36 kilowatts of energy. New thin film tech panels are over 13 percent efficient. That’s 136 watts per meter. Other heavy panels are over 15 percent efficient. So depending on the type you get you will need 20 to 22 panels. Prices have come down to less than a dollar per watt for solar cells and so it depends on what company you buy from and how much work you want to do yourself. If you have to have everything done for you it will be expensive. LED lighting is the best for energy savings, though fiber optics or mirrors directing sunlight would be more efficient and bring in warmth in the winter time.
My math is wrong above, watts at 13% are about 177, and at 15% are 200 watts per square meter panel. So 15 panels might be enough. $3,000 dollars for a DIY person, then a minimal 4 batteries and a 3,000 watt inverty by Cobra or whatever brand Harbor Freight offers and you will be in business for around 3600 dollars. The real trick is drying cloths in the wintertime. Radiant heat from a cloudy sky will still warm a solar panel, but you would want a ducted air panel to create warm air directly and make it available right to your dryer which could still use electricity to turn the motor and fan to dry cloths. Another source of warm air is the attic. But for the winter time a special warm air ducted solar panel must be made dedicated to that purpose.
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