This is a project to develop residential photovoltaic systems, solar systems, and energy-saving devices for homes, agricultural, and solar farm uses. Many of these systems utilize a roof-mounted photovoltaic array and allow excess solar-generated electric energy to be fed back to the local utility grid, eliminating the need for on-site storage. Photovoltaics and other forms of solar energy are the ideal fuel inasmuch as they do not pollute the environment and are a completely renewable fuel.
PV modularity, simplicity, reliability and low maintenance requirements have been firmly established. Photovoltaic systems have a variety of applications, including power for houses, navigational aids, remote lighting, communication stations, weather stations, water pumping, and general stand alone power systems. In addition, commercial applications number in the tens of thousands worldwide.
Photovoltaic(PV) power systems combine within a single technology a source of energy in its most versatile form---electric: the means to directly convert energy from a virtually infinite source---the sun; and the power to generate power via a non-polluting process---the photovoltaic effect.
The growth in demand for electrical energy (solar) as a primary source of building energy can be attributed to its versatility to applying all building energy needs, including heating. For much modern equipment and appliances, it is the preferred or required form of energy. Expectations for the lifetime of the solar resource exceed 6 billion years with little reduction of its steady output of 130 billion megawatts incident upon the earth. The photovoltaic effect produces electrical energy via the direct interaction of solar radiation and the electrons of PV or solar cell. This photoelectric interaction does not generate any reaction products other than conduction electrons and thereby avoids many of the environmental problems associated with combustion and nuclear technologies. The favorable set of circumstances underlies the potential of photovoltaic power and the increase in demand for energy(electrical) should come from the use of photovoltaics and other alternate sources of energy.
As far as nuclear plants to produce electrical energy; there is a great deal of downside in any new nuclear power plants such as:
1- They produce a great deal of nuclear waste which no one knows how to get rid of safely. 2- these proposed new nuclear plants are very costly and 3-take a very long time (10 to 11 years) to complete. At last count, the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant which was originally budgeted at 800 million will cost over 8 billion dollars plus finance costs. Shoreham was over ten years behind schedule and ten times over budget which does not include finance charges of 16 billion dollars, bringing the final cost of the Shoreham Nuclear Plant to 25 billion dollars to the consumer. Because the Shoreham Nuclear Plant was such a potential hazard to NY metropolitan area it was bought by NY state for $1 and decommissioned without going on line for one day. The case for photovoltaics is just the reverse. In the next ten years, the cost of photovoaaltaics and other renewable energy products should steadily decline. Any use of photovoltaics and renewable energy systems can adhere to a firm schedule time. These facts make photovoltaics and solar energy much more attractive to draw away from from the vast amounts of money spent on nuclear power and petroleum.
Also, photovoltaic systems provide the opportunity to bring electricity to people and areas which have never had power for refrigeration, water pumping, lighting, and other basic necessities. For many applications, stand-alone photovoltaic power has been proven to be more reliable, and less costly, than conventional electrical generating systems.
American Photovoltaics & Homes presently has over one thousand designs of homes and other structures that can be powered by photovoltaics, co-generation and/or renewable fuels. In addition, we are presently working on consumer PV powered products such as: PV radios, PV powered lights and batteries, PV plant reminders, PV educational kits, PV house numbers, and emergency car starters.
International Energy Outlook 2010
