| By :
Alec Deacon
So, you think it's time to build your own solar energy sytem to cut bills or have a cleaner source of energy for your household. Before you start working on something you need to know how it works. Solar energy is created by sunrays that reach our planet in just a few minutes after they leave the Sun's surface traveling the distance of 93 million miles in a few minutes. After all, light travels with the speed of light. The atmosphere absorbs most of this energy and one third of the sunlight is sent back into space. What's left is what we may use to create energy. Did you know that the largest solar battery on our planet is Earth itself? It can absorb around 174,000 billion kilowatts (kW) from the Sun each 60 minutes? All in all, by now you should realize that the light produced on one sq m during a clear summer noon, is generating around 1000 Watts. Unfortunately, the biggest part of this energy goes to waste. The energy that does not go to waste generates the winds and helps sustain life. Green organisms use it to make oxygen, animals and humans need it to strengthen their organisms. However, we have come to that time in our evolution where we can gather more energy from the Sun. You need to know that the types of solar energy are direct or indirect, active or passive. Direct solar energy is made when sunlight is striking a solar cell directly and electricity is generated immediately. It directly changes, without any intermediate process. On the other hand, indirect solar energy needs one more step to change sunlight into useable energy. It is the case of hydroelectric generators and wind turbines, transforming solar-caused wind, rain and other climatic interactions into power. We can transform sunlight into another type of energy by: Solar thermal processes: Sun energy is transformed into heat. In this process, the sun's heat is collected by solar panels which then heat water which can be used to heat households. The panels are always placed on the top of a buliding or in a place where they have plenty of sunlight, and are introduced afterwards into a system of tubes called "thermal collectors" to the heating source. Photovoltaic processes: Unlike the water heating systems, through this process, photovoltaic cells absorb the sun's light instead of its warmth, so sunlight is changed into electricity. They are regarded as the future of power generators and are often silicon-based pieces of material. Solar panels are built of many of such cells, put together.
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