Nice enough to live in Scores of small companies from chimney sweeps to solar panel installers are seeing a boom in business as people faced with soaring fuel bills look for cheaper energy deals. Solar panels, typically lining the roofs of buildings, can now be found across America in more eccentric forms — shingles, windows, awnings and free-standing carports.

With the average household’s annual energy bill now more than $2,000 (£1,300), comparatively cheaper sources of household energy such as solar power and solid fuel are tempting,
>>Keep reading “Solar carports”

Longer days in Dedougou Hema Cecile is a student in Burkina Fasso, the world’s second poorest country. Thanks to a recent initiative from the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) her studies are more productive now.

The launch of Lighting Africa three months ago allowed her (and another thousand households in the town of Dedougou) to swap kerosene lamps for solar- powered lanterns. The LED lights use almost no power, and can keep shining all night if required. That should mean a more productive, better educated, wealthier population — a virtuous circle of reduced energy use and increased economic activity.
>>Keep reading “Lighting Africa”

Katsuhiko Machida (right) At a trade show in Yokohama in May, Sharp Corp.’s booth was swarmed by visitors from African countries, including embassy officials and businesspeople, who wanted to know when the company was going to launch its new solar power system and at what price.

The system, which combines solar cells and storage batteries to generate electricity had some innovative features.

The consumer electronics maker aims to sell the system for less than one-tenth the 2-3 million yen ($18,100-27,200) charged for comparable home-use systems currently available in Japan, by designing it to supply power only for lighting equipment, radios and electric fans - items it regards as the most basic necessities for off-grid users.
>>Keep reading “$1800 12V solar system”

Soldius 1 - Best of the rest
If you are going off the grid for a weekend, you can use small solar chargers to power up phones, MP3 players and other devices - so which is the best?

Portable solar chargers have come on in recent years, but still have a way to go - they mainly require strong, direct sunlight to work reliably. At the bottom end of the market, you can easily get a 5 Watt, 12 Volt Solar Power Portable Panel that’s good for charging the small devices within a few hours (Click here for UK delivery).

Solio is one of the biggest names and one of the worst. It has spent a lot on PR - but the product sucks.
>>Keep reading “Portable solar chargers”

Source: US Dept of Energy, 2008
This is the year that the cost of electricity from solar power will drop below the cost of grid-generated power.

The long-awaited fall in the cost of solar power is just around the corner. As huge amounts of additional manufacturing capacity come on stream over the next few months, the price of grid-electricity continues to rise.
>>Keep reading “Solar prices set to slump”

Kristin Davis au naturel
Sex and the City actress Kristin Davis is off-grid ready, she has told David Letterman.

Her new solar-powered home allows her to go off-grid at the flip of a switch .

‘I’m off the grid. I have a ladder that I climb up and I check my solar panels. They cover the whole roof, in LA, where there’s a lot of sun. And when the sun is shining, you can go and look and your electrical meter and it’s spinning backwards! It’s very exciting
>>Keep reading “Kristin Davis off-grid ready”

This guide to solar power is taken from How to Live Off-Grid: Journeys Outside the System by Nick Rosen. You can buy the book here.

Next year’s swimsuit charges phones.

The age of solar power is fast approaching, but its not quite here yet. Cost and efficiency are improving all the time, but not fast enough for our liking. The wearable solar panel pictured is expensive as a phone charger, but still cheap as a fashion item.

There are three kinds of solar panel, based on the way the silicon is cut. The first is monocrystalline. That is the most expensive and the most efficient (at 15 per cent) at converting the sun’s rays into energy. The second is polycrystalline, which, as its name suggests, is the combination of more than one slice of crystal; it’s 13 per cent efficient. And the least expensive and efficient (at 9 per cent) is called amorphous.
>>Keep reading “Intro to solar power”

Living the 12-volt life is easy if you know how. Without a mains connection, you can either generate power and then turn it into 110 or 240 volts using an inverter, or you can leave it as 12 volts to save money and power.

There are so many 12-volt gadgets these days - made for cars, RVs or boats that you can get anything from a stereo to a washing machine in a 12-volt variety. But this excellent book is overstating it by calling itself “A Do It Yourself Guide.” After reading it, I would be more inclined to hand it to an electrician and tell him, or her, to follow the complex diagrams.

When it comes to wiring a 12-volt set-up you need to be extra careful to use the right kind of extra-thick cable, because 12 volt cables become very hot and can cause fires. You also need to be careful you get your positive and negative wires the right way around, or you can cause battery explosions and fires.
>>Keep reading “12-volt guide book”

Political statement
Last week, Berkeley’s Shotgun Players in San Francisco become the first mainstream stage company to pull all its power from the sun. The $120,000 investment will not only save the group about $10,000 a year, but also shows that solar is a practical way for a smaller entertainment operation to make an ecological stand.

“This all started as a conversation about what ways we could make ourselves a more integral part of the community,” says Patrick Dooley, Shotgun’s artistic director. “We talked about a lot of things, but we kept coming back to solar.”

Since its start 15 years ago, Shotgun Players has offered plays that make it sort of a “conscience of the community,” says Dooley.
>>Keep reading “Berkeley playhouse goes off-grid”