Use of solar energy for heating, hot water, pool heating

One of the most promising ways to get rid of fossil energy is through the use of alternative energy sources. In this article we will pay attention to the use of solar collectors.

As you know, solar collectors are quite a progressive tool, with the help of which you will be able to provide yourself with hot water in the first place, and you will also be able to replenish the heating system in the winter season.

And so, what is a solar collector?

First of all, it is a heat exchanger, the main function of which is the conversion of solar energy into thermal energy of a heat carrier, and the task of a heat carrier is to heat water in a tank, tank, or heating system.

As we have already found out, collectors are used for heating water for various purposes: hot water supply, heating, for swimming pools. Therefore, at the first stage, you need to decide for what specific purpose will we use the ego?

After setting the goal, we proceed to the choice of the manufacturer and model of the device itself, because there are already a lot of them on the market. So what is the current classification?

The entire group of solar collectors can be divided into:

- Flat:

            in which the advantages can be attributed to their low price with a rather high performance in the summer
            in the disadvantages it should be noted a very low efficiency in the winter, high complexity during installation, this collector is a one-piece non-separable design.

There is also a subspecies of flat collectors - vacuum flat collectors. They have maximum performance in their class by creating a vacuum inside the box. However, their price is very high and requires complex installation.

- Tubular vacuum solar collectors:

            Of the advantages they distinguish are quite simple installation, greater efficiency in the winter season compared to flat ones, due to the presence of vacuum and minimal heat loss;
            disadvantages: some models cannot work under high pressure, also some subspecies do not work in winter.

Tubular subspecies:

- Coaxial vacuum tubes direct heating (do not work in winter)

- Coaxial vacuum tubes with heat-pipe system

- Coaxial vacuum tubes with U-type system

- Feather vacuum tubes

We studied what it is and what tasks can be solved, what types are there, their pros and cons. Next, we need to study your climate zone, since the effectiveness of robots directly depends on solar insolation (solar radiation). This will help us evaluate both the average annual productivity and the performance of robots in winter and summer. The calculations use averaged data on solar radiation and weather given per 1m2 of a certain type of collector.

The next step, without changing our approaches, after determining goals and objectives is the choice of a model with specific characteristics. We select all kinds of components:

- controllers;

- expansion tanks;

- corrugations and pipes;

- pumping stations;

- storage tanks and so on;

and proceeds to the final stage - the creation of a scheme to complete the task.

Read more about solar collectors -> HERE

An example of a heating system project you can see HERE.