How To Save On Energy Costs With A Home Solar Panel

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by: Ryan Narendra
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Date: Fri, 26 Feb 2010 Time: 9:51 AM
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One of the most eco-friendly ways of cutting away at electricity bills is to generate your own electricity at home. A home solar panel won't eliminate the need to have electricity delivered by the power company, but it doesn't require much (if any) upkeep and won't take too many years to earn back the cost of purchase. Solar panel technology is becoming increasingly efficient and decreasingly expensive.

Around 30 years ago the solar technology industry went through a boom of sorts, but it was unfortunately very short lived. At that time, government assistance and the novelty of having solar panels grabbed the attention of potential customers, only to have the tax breaks and subsidies canceled by a new administration in the early 1980's. The new boost to the solar industry is here to stay.

Now that global warming has become a consistent, insistent presence in everyday discourse, the new tax credits and subsidies should last much longer. They might even become permanently implemented. What this means for the potential purchaser of solar panels is a reduced initial investment.

For most of these customers, their primary interest in buying solar panels is to generate electricity (rather than simply heat water), which means that the type of technology to look for is called "photovoltaic" (or PV) solar cells. These are available in prebuilt panels or do it yourself kits. The latter is significantly cheaper, but the former will probably be more of the cutting edge stuff and will be the most efficient.

PV panels usually work at around 12 percent efficiency, while the top of the line models just top 17 percent efficiency. It will probably be a matter of years over the course of homeownership before the panels earn back their initial investment. On the other hand, the electricity bills will go down right away.

A new photovoltaic panel installed on or around the home will also diminish the amount of carbon your household is responsible for, and these benefits start right away. The carbon and energy used to produce them will also be saved in a much shorter time than the monetary cost. It's possible to start working down your carbon output right away with solar PV panel.

About the Author

As I was writing the above article about home solar panel, it struck me that you may be interested in reading this too: I hope you find it useful power bill pay and solar cost

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