What Are Solar Panels?

Solar panels are flat collections of solar cells that are used to catch the Sun’s energy and use it to create electricity and heat. Because the sun’s energy is so spread out it takes a collection of solar cells to generate enough energy to make electricity or heat. Solar panels come in different sizes and shapes so that they can be used on a variety of different types of buildings but no matter what shape or size they are the basic design of a solar panel is the same.

How do solar cells work?

Solar cells are wafers made of a semi-conductive material, usually silicon, combined with rarer elements such as phosphorus and boron. The silicon is what grabs the energy from the sun and traps it to be used for electricity while the phosphorus and the boron help excite the molecules and intensify the energy that is coming into the cell. When the sun’s rays hit the silicon and are channeled through the cell the molecules excite and travel through an attached electrical circuit, creating electricity.

Solar panels convert anywhere from about 14% to about 22% of the sun’s energy that hits the panel into electricity. That doesn’t seem like a lot of electricity produced but the amount of electricity that a solar panel can generate also depends on where the panel is positioned and how much direct sun it gets. When there is no sun or the panel isn’t in the directly sunlight it gets little or no sun and will produce little or no electricity. The low efficiency of solar cells is a problem to their large-scale use. It takes many large solar panels of solar cells to provide enough electricity to power a house or a building.

Solar panels produce electricity that can be used for lighting but solar panel energy can also be used to heat a home or building. A solar thermal heating system consists of solar panels that are arranged in a specific spot where the solar panel energy is used to heat a tank of water. The hot water runs under the floors of the house, heating them, and then the water is piped back to the tank to be heated again.

Thermal solar heating systems work very well and are a cost effective and environmentally friendly alternative to expensive gas or electric heating systems. Solar thermal energy is often used quite a bit by people that have pools and outdoor hot tubs to heat the water they use. It’s a lot less expensive to heat a large pool or a hot tub with thermal solar energy than it is to use fossil fuel heaters that can cost a fortune.