Solar energy Definition and 86 Threads

comparing a flat solar panel of area 2π r² and a hemisphere of the same area, the hemispherical solar panel would only occupy the area π r² of while the flat panel would occupy an entire 2π r² of land. wouldn't the hemispherical version have the same area of panel exposed to the sun, occupy...

Hello Physics Forums! It is only my second post here, so sorry if I am not perfectly following the rules... We were wondering with some colleagues a few hours ago, what is the threshold where PV panels are adding a carbon footprint to the electricity generated on the grid considering the...

I am working on a sanity check for capacity vs load and if anyone here has experience with off-grid solar, any feedback would be much appreciated. The application is to run a fridge and a modem off-grid on a piece of land in New Mexico. I read that in December (worst case month) the area gets...

I'd like to take Solar Panel power output and use it to power an AC outlet on the ultra-cheap. I know a lot of people use Solar to connect to a purpose built inverter and also have a battery somewhere in the mix to provide a stable output but wondering if the following (using the assumptions...

How efficient are solar panels? How can their efficiency improve? Besides their benefits, what are the ecological impacts of solar energy?

Now before i take a ton of beating I'm not a Physicist this thread was a google command away looking for a physicists. I am an entrepreneur from the Blockchain world and before that the IT world. Now with the Current World Economic Forum, green bonds and saving our planet conversations i would...

I live at 60 degrees north. On december 22nd the sun is only 8 degrees above the horizon at noon. Here lots of people say they would go off grid if they just could have a reliable electricity production during the winter. All the sellers of solar cells talks about maximizing the cells production...

I have one project in my mind bu tI have no eductaion in this topic. please help. question is: if there is container of water. and we have certain number of solar rays getting into this container how does process of water warm up look like comparing: 1. direct sun rays into water vs 2. on...

Hi everybody, I'm working on a Solar Energy project and I'm a newbie in this field. Could you suggest some good intro books/articles and PV system simulation books? (I'm using MATLAB) Note that my major in university are Solid State Physics and Computational Physics so I will not hesitate to...

Total Solar Energy Rejected (TSER) = The percentage of total solar energy rejected by filmed glass. The higher this value, the less solar heat is transmitted. Here is something puzzling. I bought two tints to try on windows. The lower one on the left (NR Smoke 20) has Total Solar Energy...

Since solar and wind power are fluctuating energy sources not all of it goes into the grid when the consumer power demand is lower than that actually produced. This is a well-known drawback of solar and wind energy that everyone talks about. What I never found is an assessment of how much of the...

Hello, I am writing a blog article about storing solar energy as heat. Can someone credible check this? I calculated I need 185.4 liters of vegetable oil to substitute a 6.4kWh battery if I had the same energy conversion (Tesla says 90%) and energy loss over time (no idea about this value) as...

Homework Statement First I will say, I know I post here alot, but that is because I have exams coming up soon and I am a beginner, and It's crunch time, I'm self taught with only the help of friends and the internet. I'm currently doing a past examination as practice, but this one is much...

Hi everyone, i'd like to share my packaged (plug and play) solar system project that I assembled at home. I used mostly standard parts such as a charge controller, inverter, 12 Volt UPS battery, and a pair of NEMA 5-15 R power outlets. I built the automatic transfer switch and battery...

I have selected a topic for my research work which is "nanostructured materials for solar energy conversion" I have read many of articles, most of which are about Li batteries but I want to do something new. Anyone who's in this field suggests something new.:smile:

Hello, the name's Mike and I'm a newbie here, I have a question pertaining to solar angles required to calculate a solar panel's hourly generation over one year. Total solar irradiance on a tilted surface equals the sum of the direct, diffuse and reflected component. In my case, reflection is...

You can burn a hole in paper using a magnifying glass and light. What would happen if you applied this large-scale on a solar panel?

This is a fun thought experiment; Why not have space based mirrors to reflect light down to Earth at night to make solar do a little extra generating! The cost of solar is coming down and the cost of lifting things into orbit is coming down, so why not. Plus gold is very reflective, light...

The engine of a solar car I am designing(for my fictional stories but I would like a scientific point of view on this) is literally a DC circuit combined with mechanical force. First of all, there is a rechargeable battery. I would say it is about 24V fully charged. There are 2 wires coming off...

Hi, I love learning, and from time to time I run into questions that google, local education institutes, and general information hunting at the library comes up fruitless. So to you physics forum I turn! About me - Father, husband, geek, techie, cancer survivor x2, retired soldier/IT...

How much energy can be produced by a solar cell in mars?

For a business project, I'm looking into the viability of a greenhouse situated in Canada's far northern town of Iqaluit. The problem is how to mathematically simulate the internal air temperature of the greenhouse. What I already have are detailed 3D renderings of the greenhouse as well as all...

I'm trying to understand the link between Spectral Sensitivity and Solar Energy. To give some context, I've been learning about external quantum efficiency and spectral response. I found a lot of literature about spectral sensitivity, with one saying the units of it were Ampres / lux. Is...

Homework Statement A solar heater is used to warm 150 kg of water by 30 K. The intensity of solar radiation is 6000 Wm-2 and the area of the panels is 4.0 m2. The specific heat capacity of the water is 4.2 * 103 J/kg/K. Estimate the time this will take, assuming a solar panel efficiency of...

I am using TRYNSYS software to simulate solar thermal cooling. I need to install many solar thermal panels (evacuated tubes) in parallel. However, there is no feature to do that automatically in the software; so I can only add them manually with complex piping and stuff. So my question is: Is...

i want a list of books related to photovoltaics specifically the ones related to the mechanism

Hello. My name is Jack. New member to the forums. Nice to meet you all! I have a general question that is part of a project I am working on for graduate school. I'm looking to distill water through solar energy in a closed solar still and am in a pickle finding a way to prevent alcohol from...

Homework Statement "The urban heat island (UHI) effect refers to the phenomenon of a metropolitan or built up area which is significantly warmer than its surrounding areas." Using white paint in roofs increases the solar reflectance and decrease the thermal intake into a building. Question:-...

Hi, I am working on Solar systems in Australia. I want to know the Australian standards for grid connected PV systems for voltage, power factor, reactive power etc.

I have seen a lot of effort go into finding cheap, safe, high energy density phase change materials to store energy in the form of heat so power produced during the daytime may be delivered at night time. But I have an issue with storing energy in phase change materials. They rely on chemicals...

Thank you for the welcome Greg, I have been in electronics for many years, since 1965, and enjoyed every moment. I have done extensive work on magnetic ferrite core memories and frequency synthesisers in the military manpack arena. I have also done very low current circuitry using cmos devices...

So I had this idea and I want to run it by some people and see if it's 1) possible 2) worthy of pursuing further 3) a good idea. I don't have a degree in engineering or physics, I'm currently studying chemistry and am taking physics 2 (E&M) right now, so excuse me if I don't use the correct...

I'm looking for ways to help mitigate California's drought. I've come up with two ideas. The first is a pipeline from Washington. The pipeline could be built with similar construction principles to an oil pipeline, which is a pretty mature process. The water could be sold to California...

Hello all, this is my first time posting here so please excuse if this maybe isn't the appropriate thread to post this in but I figured it may be the most relevant. I am working on writing a proposal (small, just 450 words), that aims to address the energy efficiency of a university, ie...

My understanding is that the seasonal variation in temperature, amongst many other things, is a reflection of the Earth's tilt. Simply put, at the equator, sun rays fall "straight down" (100% vertical), and all of their energy hits the surface of the Earth. At different latitudes, these rays...

From a top-level view, what exactly are people working on in solar these days? Efficiency? Cost? Both? What are the parameters people really have to vary? Crystalline, polycrystalline, amorphous? Binary, ternary, quaternary compounds? Crystal structure (I have heard perovskites are a hot...

Homework Statement Hey guys Concentrated photovoltaic systems are known for high efficiency performance compared to that of a standard solar panel. But, what's confusing me is the reason behind using lesser photovoltaic material in CPV systems. Can't we use the solar panel of the same size...

So i was wondering could you use two helio stats so there was two refraction points, the second one focusing the beam of solar energy back downwards? If so could you use multiple helio stats to meet at refraction point # 2 magnifying the beam that's pointed downwards? In theory it should work...

So I'm currently working on a project. Among the research questions, the following is one of them. "How can we use optical equipment such as mirrors to increase the output current?" I did some research into it but couldn't find its technical aspect. I know the straightforward fact that the...

Homework Statement What size FPC is needed to supply a family's domestic hot water needs in March in Denver, CO? Assume 80 gallons per day are needed (1gal=8.3 lb.) for the water and that the collector-heat exchanger system has an average efficiency of 40%. The collector tilt angle is equal to...

Homework Statement How much percent can CPVs (Concentrated Photovoltaic cells) convert solar energy into electrical energy? Homework EquationsThe Attempt at a Solution According to this page, "http://www.benefits-of-recycling.com/solarenergycars-2/ ", 20% of solar energy is converted into...

Homework Statement I have attached the problem as an image and they are same as below. The collector-receiver combination tested above is chosen for use in a solar thermal power plant. plant consists of 100 rows of collector-receiver modules. For the receiver efficiency use the value...

Hi, I'm trying to find equation for an amount of solar energy that given place (of some latitude) on Earth's surface receives during a given day. I know it can be derived by using basic geometry, but I just need it for some application and don't want to waste time and risk mistakes. So if you...

Hi everyone--first post, thanks for any guidance if I've posted in the wrong place. I've got a simple idea and I'm curious if it's worthwhile doing. How effective would putting a dark surface (perhaps black tiles, or black corrugated plastic) on the bottom of the pool, to warm the water by...

In the i,Robot book -by Issac Asimov- one of the stories mention some sort of satellite for gathering solar energy. Basically this satellite will be stationary outside of our orbit, and it will gather solar energy and intensify it into a beam that is transmitted into a base on earth. I...

Hi, apparently you can calculate the amount of energy the sun delivers to each square meter of the Earth using an umbrella, tin can, water and a thermometer. You put the tin can outside with some water in it and put the umbrella over it until it reaches ambient temperature. You then take the...

Is it possible to use solar energy to provide locomotion in Space? I appreciate that Solar sails have been mooted but is there any way that the energy from the sun can be used in such a way as to approach the source of the light?

Hi. I will be starting college this fall and I am interested in pursuing a career in Nanotechnology - particularly its application to Solar energy. I have not declared a major at this point and was wondering what would be the best major to help me go into this field. I hear EE and Chem eng are...

Homework Statement I don't know if this is a physics problem per se but its from physics class. So we were supposed to pick out a solar panel and figure out what is the cost per unit of energy for this form of solar energy? I know where supposed to use the data sheet for the panel that we...

i have to come up with expression that governs the rate of solar energy incident upon the Earth with radius of Earth, Re, power output of Sun 4*10^26 and distance from Earth to Sun as 1.5*10^11. But i have no idea how to get the expression HELP