Solar Electric Systems

Solar Electric Systems. Photovoltaic systems. PV systems.

All three terms describe systems that convert solar energy directly to electric current. The most common systems use photo-electric effects in semiconductor materials. The materials are used to form solar cells that are assembled and wired together in panels of various sizes. In turn, the panels are connected together in series and parallel combinations to provide electric current to drive equipment or to batteries for storage.

Solar power systems may be designed to drive an individual load such as a monitoring station or communications device. Solar systems may also be used to drive multiple electrical loads.

In a residential application, the house may be off-grid (totally independent on the power grid), or on-grid. On-grid houses may operate their system totally independently from the grid or may feed extra power back to the grid.

Finally, large solar power arrays may function as a power source for the grid just like any other generating station. The main difference with a solar power station is that the power is dependent on solar conditions and is not available on demand.

PV Concentrator Systems

Flat panel solar arrays only produce maximum power when they are at right angles to the sun. For a fixed display, this only happens for a brief moment each day. The sun changes its position in the sky so if you set up a flat array to receive the sun at right angles, this will only be true on one or two days of the year.

To imrove the situation, you would need to add a "tracker" - typically a mechanical system that changes the position of the array to always point at the sun. Trackers add expense and maintenance costs to solar arrays.

If you don't have a tracker, you will typically need to increase the size of the aray to get a certain amount of solar energy. This approach increases the cost (more panels) and the amount of ground or roof space covered by the array.

Concentrator systems attempt to increse the energy yield from each solar component by using reflectors to concentrate more of the sun's energy on each collector. The objective is to reduce cost by using less semiconductor material and also to reduce the space consumed by the solar array.



Notes
Electric
Solar Panels
Solar Cells
Batteries
Inverters
Controllers
Off-grid
On grid

Manufacturers of PV Cells and Modules

BP Solar
Evergreen Solar
First Solar Electric
Isofoton
Konarka
Kurdex
RWE SCHOTT Solar
Sanyo
Sharp Solar
Shell Solar
SunPower Corp
Unaxis
United Solar Ovonic


Advanced Energy Systems, Inc.
Alpha Solarco, Inc.
Ascension Technology, Inc.
ASE Americas, Inc.
AstroPower, Inc.
Boeing Aerospace Corporation
BP Solar International, LLC
Chronar Corporation
Crystal Systems, Inc.
Dow Corning Corporation
Energy Conversion Devices, Inc.
Energy Photovoltaics, Inc.
ENTECH, Inc.
Evergreen Solar, Inc.
First Solar, LLC
GE Energy (USA), LLC
Glasstech Solar, Inc.
Global Photovoltaic Specialists, Inc.
Global Solar Energy, Inc.
Golden Photon, Inc.
Iowa Thin Film Technologies, Inc.
ITN Energy Systems, Inc.
Kopin Corporation
Mobil Solar Energy Corporation
Omnion Power Engineering Corporation
Photon Energy, Inc.
Photovoltaics International, LLC
PowerLight Corporation
RWE SCHOTT Solar, Inc.
SCHOTT Solar, Inc.
Shell Solar Industries
Shingleton Design, LLC
Siemens Solar Industries, LP
Sinton Consulting, Inc.
Solar Cells, Inc.
Solar Design Associates, Inc.
Solar Electric Specialties, Inc.
Solar Engineering Application Corporation
Solar Kinetics, Inc.
Solarex Corporation
Specialized Technology Resources, Inc.
Spectrolab, Inc.
Spire Corporation
Springborn Laboratories, Inc.
SunPower Corporation
Texas Instruments, Inc.
Trace Engineering Company, Inc.
Utility Power Group, Inc.
Westinghouse Electric Corporation
Xantrex Technology, Inc.

Other Solar Manufacturers

Kyocera