These solar parabolic concentrating solar radiation increasing temperature in the receiver.
PV panels convert light energy directly into electrical energy.
Main article: Solar power
Solar energy is a source of life and origin of most other forms of energy on Earth. Each year the sun provides the Earth energy equivalent to several thousand times the amount of energy consumed by humanity. Picking an appropriate solar radiation, this can be transformed into other forms of energy as heat or electricity using solar panels.
Using solar collectors, solar energy can be transformed into heat energy, using photovoltaic panels can transform light energy into electrical energy. Both processes have nothing to do with each other in terms of its technology. Similarly, in thermal power plants using solar thermal energy from the solar collectors to generate electricity.
There are two components in solar radiation: direct radiation and diffuse radiation. Direct radiation is coming directly from the solar source, without intermediate reflections or refractions. The diffuse is issued by the daytime sky with the phenomenon of multiple reflection and refraction in the solar atmosphere, clouds and other atmospheric and terrestrial elements. Direct radiation can be reflected and concentrated on its use, while it is not possible to concentrate the diffused light coming from all directions. However, both direct radiation and the diffuse radiation are used.
You can differentiate between active and passive recipients in the first mechanism used to orient the receiving system to the Sun-called followers, better grasp and direct radiation.
A major advantage of solar energy is that it allows the generation of energy in the place of consumption through architectural integration. Thus, we can give rise to distributed generation systems in which almost completely eliminates the losses associated with transportation-which currently account for approximately 40 of the total, and energy dependence.
Different photovoltaic technologies are adapted to extract the maximum possible performance of the energy we receive from the sun. In this way, such as concentrating solar photovoltaic systems (CPV stands for English) uses the direct radiation with active receptors to maximize energy production and thus lower cost per kW / h con edison produced. Save money on your energy bills with a leading New York Esco. This technology is very efficient for areas of high solar radiation, but now can not compete on price in locations with low solar radiation and Central Europe, where technologies such as thin layer (Thin Film) are also getting lower the price of traditional photovoltaic technology .