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How Solar Power Works

Using solar panels to produce electricity is called Photovoltaics. Photovoltaics uses a solar cell to produce a direct current to convert light into electricity. Solar Cell Calculators are a basic example of this technology. This can also be seen on cars or houses with solar panels on the roof. When using Solar Power for your house you need four main components for producing solar power for your home: Solar Panels, Charge Controller, Battery and Inverter.

The Solar Panels themselves create energy by separating the negative and positive fields from light protons using different layers of Silicon. This creates a charge that can be sent to the Charge Controller, which regulates the amount of current that will go to your Battery and DC Loads. The purpose of this is to keep your Batteries from getting too much current resulting in an overload. The Battery will also store power while there is no sun. The Battery then sends power to the Inverter which will invert the power in to AC Power which will allow the power to be used by the appliances in your house.

When using Solar Panels generating the maximum amount of energy from your solar panels is a must. Despite the sun being up for 14 hours on a normal day you generally only get 6 hours of direct sunlight. This will increase in the summer and decrease in the winter, but will also be slightly different based on geographical location. One way to maximize the amount of sunlight is to make sure your Solar Panels face to the true south.

Another tip to get the most efficiency from the Solar Panels on your Container Home is to make the Panels adjustable to account for the angel of the sun's path during different times of the year. As illustrated by this chart, the sun is much higher in the summer than the winter. The ability to move your Solar Panels to a different angle will greatly increase the amount of sunlight the Solar Panels can absorb.

An additional thing to keep in mind is how you wire your Solar Panels. It is essential to get the benefits of both a series circuit and a parallel circuit when you are wiring your solar panels. It is also important to keep in mind that the energy produced form Solar Panels is measured in Watts. The basic formula for figuring out the watts is Watts = Volts x Amps.

Series Wiring - Four 12 volt/5 amp panels wired in a series produces 48 volts/5 amps.

Parallel Wiring - Four 12 volt/5 amp panels wired in a parallel produce 12 volts/20 amps

The diagram below is an example of how to wire a series/parallel circuit. By doing this you will gain the advantages to both a series circuit and a parallel circuit and double the amount of wattage you are receiving form your Solar Panels. In our case we would take four panels that each produce 12 volts and 5 amps and produce 48 volts and 20 amps, or 960 Watts.

Solar Water Heating

Another Solar idea you may want to consider when building a Container Home is to use a Solar Water Heater. A typical electric water heater uses about 11 barrels of oil in a given year. Using a Solar Water Heater would, in some cases, eliminate the dependency of oil when heating the water in your home. In the long run this will save you money, make your home better for the environment, and provide independence from the use of fossil fuels.

Though there are many different designs for generating hot water from the sun, the area, or climate, of where you live will ultimately narrow your choices. Because of cold weather in some areas, some designs have been made to carry an antifreeze to keep the water from freezing when sent from your collector to your home. Because of this, it is cheaper to install Solar Water Heaters in a warm climate area. This does not mean that it is not cost effective in a colder climate, it just means that the up-front costs are a bit higher.

The easiest way to explain how a solar water heater works is the Solar Batch Heater design. In the example the batch heater is essentially a tank of water enclosed in a glass box to heat the water. The glass box needs to be on the exterior of the house aimed carefully at the sun. With conventional water heaters the cold water runs directly in to the storage tank where heated. In this case, the water is directed to the Batch Heater, then when heated, is sent to the storage tank and then to your house for use.

While Batch heaters are the easiest to describe and are usually the model put together by most Do-It-Yourselfers, this model is not recommended to be used when in cold temperatures unless altered. Using a larger tank can help provide protection from freezing, but you must consider that a 40 gallon tank weighs approximately 500 pounds. You also need to remember that your size may be limited because the tank must fit in to the glass box (or collector).

If you do live in an area where freezing may be a greater issue, there are other similar designs that have an extra line that circulates antifreeze to prevent freezing in your pipes and collector.

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