HOME

Solar power for Conservatories – from my MySolarPower

As we have discussed in other sections on the MySolarPower site, photovoltaic cells come in many shapes and colours, from solar tiles and solar panels to transparent cells that you can use on conservatories and glass, to allow you to have your solar conservatory.

Why not utilise your conservatory to generate electricity or simply to provide heat where and when you want it?

We all use blinds to shade ourselves in conservatories, then why not use transparent PV cells on the conservatory roof to not only generate our own electricity and / or solar heating but also provide shading?

Solar panels in most forms are simple to install, will help to improve your personal carbon footprint, and a major potential benefit for most of us, will save you money.

Conservatory solar heating

Getting a solar panel heater for your conservatory is not expensive and is usually considerably less to run than other heat sources, lets face it; we are using a naturally occurring source of energy – solar power - these types of heating panels are most commonly long and this and can often be installed along the bottom of a wall – so they are hardly obtrusive

Conservatory solar electricity generation

.Back in 2002 the Dept of Trade & Industry commissioned a report that looked into the possible benefits or otherwise of solar power system for conservatories.

The report tended to demonstrate a good deal of consumer interest in PV systems for conservatories – surveys showed that the majority of consumers who already owned conservatories mostly used them throughout the year and therefore also used energy for facilities such as heating, light and TV’s etc within the conservatory . As many conservatories are placed in areas of a natural sun trap there are often ideally located – in order not to detract from the look of the conservatory it was felt that the further development of thin-film technology would be beneficial and that manufacturers may; at some time in the future, start to develop solar conservatories with Solar PV built-in.

The technology marches on.

Thin-film solar technology continues to develop at quite some pace and it is now being incorporated into BIPV – Building integrated photovoltaics as a semi-transparent solar cell not only capable of generating electricity but also acting as a tint at the same time in order to protect the occupants of the conservatory.

It is felt now that high speed production of the thin film solar cells may produce more of these in one hour as some crystalline silicon solar cell plants can manufacture in 12 months! Undoubtedly, due to this massive gain in pace, costs are falling and this specific market is gaining in its competitive edge all of the time.

The thin film cells are produced to be weather resistant and environmentally robust.

Although it seems generally accepted that they are less efficient than some more traditional solar panels they are potentially cheaper (and still decreasing) and are often infinitely more practical in being situated directly onto glass.

Even as this article is being written I have seen the latest changes and improvements in thin-film solar cells – so watch this space. 

	Solar Energy Partner Sites
Solar Energy Quotatis	Solar Energy	Solar Energy Wind Power
	Get Solar Leads