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Solar Training – A Rising Interest

SolarByTheWatt_com — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:44:20 +0000

With solar industry experiencing tremendous growth lately and surging demand for people with qualification for it interest towards solar training has grown too.

We are trying to look in this article at top recourses in solar training.

Boots on the Roof - bootsontheroof.com – US solar energy training provider, offer courses for licensed contractors from the electrical, HVAC, plumbing, roofing and general contracting areas who want to position themselves for the opportunities in wond and solar. Also training new staff for the solar and wind industry as sales professionals, project managers, engineers and designers.

AEE Solar – aeesolar.com – one of the largest solar equipment manufactures in the States also offers training. Options include hands on PV (photovoltaic) training covering design and installation, “Launch and Grow Your Solar Business” Webinar – a free webinar for people starting in the industry as new businesses, Supplier Webinars – free webinars from AEE Solar suppliers and partners, and many more. We guess the availability of free options is great with this company.

Heatspring Learning Institute – heatspring.com – an educational company focused on providing clean energy training to building professionals. The company offers courses both in solar and geothermal systems.

Training4Green – training4green.com – part of Allied Schools, offers courses like Business of Solar, Introduction to Photovoltaic Systems, Advanced Principles of Photovoltaic Systems Installation.

Solar Training Institute – trainingforsolar.com – provides accelerated training classes for contractors, electricians, engineers, solar energy entrepreneurs and sales people, and anyone who is considering a career change in the growing solar industry.

Rich Hessler Solar Sales Training – pvsolarsalestraining.com – provides complete residential sales training course for a solar sales process. The sales training includes: Understanding Photovoltaic Systems, Solar system estimate, Cost justification, Quality Solar Presentation, Handling Objections, Effectively closing a solar sale, Beginning a solar career.

US Dept. of Energy, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Solar Installer Instructor Training Network – http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/instructor_training_network.html – promotes high-quality training in the installation of solar technologies. Nine regional resource and training providers support the professional development of trainers and instructors of solar photovoltaic (PV) and solar heating and cooling (SHC) technologies across the country. The goals of Solar Installer Instructor Training are to accelerate market adoption of solar technologies by ensuring that high-quality installations are standard and to create sustainable jobs within the solar installation industry.

Step Up Education, Solar Classes Online – solarclassesonline.com – offers a fully-comprehensive online training program for individuals who want to be a part of the fast-growing solar industry. The programs they offer are mapped to industry standards to provide you with proven general and practical knowledge. Tey state: Once hired, graduates will be fully prepared to hit the ground running. Current workers in the industry will be ready to take the next step in their careers.

Solar Thermal Training Classes from SunMaxx Solar – solarthermaltraining.org – If you are a plumbing and heating expert, you have most definitely heard about the huge explosion in the Solar Hot Water Industry over the last few months and years – in fact, you have likely had customers and leads ask you about Solar Hot Water for their own homes or businesses. SunMaxx is giving you the opportunity to get in at the ground level today, and become the premier Solar Hot Water System Dealer & Installer in your area through SunMaxx Solar Hot Water Dealer Installer Program. SunMaxx is seeking professional, trained and experienced plumbing and heating specialists who are interested in adding Solar Hot Water Sales and Installation to their current business. SunMaxx Solar systems are world-renowned for their performance, reliability and simplicity – and SunMaxx Dealers & Installers put a friendly, trusting face on the SunMaxx Brand across the United States and around the world.

Sun Pirate Solar – Sun Pirate Renewable Energy Technician Solar Training – sunpiratesolar.com – Sun Pirate, Inc. is committed to provide the community, industry, organization, and student technicians with superior service and continuous education as SunPirate Inc realize the growth of the renewable energy industry only will come with applied knowledge. Through their solar training they intend to aid the growth of the industry by teaching those interested how to work on the technology involved with this emerging industry.

Solar Sphere – spheralsolar.com – solar training books, solar training videos, hands on and online training videos. every day they help more than 1000 customers find the solar power kits and solar panels they need. With a selection of over 1000 solar power kits products you are sure to find just the item you are looking for. They have been in the Solar business since 1998 and truly appreciate the opportunity to serve you today and in the future.

Wind Capacity Needed to Replace Certain Levels of Current Resources Used for Electricty Produciton

SolarByTheWatt.com — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 05:37:01 +0000

Similarly to the analysis we have done for solar we are putting the number together for the capacity needed of to replace coal, oil and natural gas with wind as sources for electricity.

We want to jump here directly to a graph comparing the different levels of electricity capacity currently generated from oil, coal, natural gas and the rest (nuclear, hydro etc) with the capacity wind power fields, farms need, the cost of investment needed and the land area used.

The assumptions are $1.3 per installed watt – much less than solar for now. And 3.8 acres per 1.5MW turbine – this is only the land used by the actual turbines and utility roads etc. not the actual land required for the field in which land can be used for agriculture or other purposes.

Click here or on the image to see full resolution graph.

The highest level displayed is not that important because it already includes renewable energy and nuclear (the argument about how clean it is and it’s safety are a subject of a separate discussion). Natural gas though not renewable is clean and still in abundant quantities in reserves. The more important part of the analysis is the lower levels – oil and coal. Look at how affordable the numbers look. Compare to the money currently the government is spending on trying to jump-start the economy anyway.

The scale is also not impossible to achieve quickly. Wind as solar is an accelerating, fast growing industry. Just to create the correct impression here of how quickly the first level – oil can be covered – it requires about 56 GW of wind power. Only in 2007 the newly installed wind power is 5.3 GW (see resources used at the bottom). So even at the same rate of investment, construction we only need 10 years to replace oil used for electricity. This is not counting the potential of solar, other renewables and the potential for the very likely accelerated addition of new wind capacity every year.

Resources Used

US Department of Energy
Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
http://www1.eere.energy.gov/windandhydro/pdfs/43025.pdf

Related Articles:

Can Solar Energy Completely Replace Fossil Fuel and Other Sources?

Solar Energy Land Area Efficiency or How Many Acres per MW, kWp per Acre

Related Info on the Web:

PickensPlan: The Plan

How Wind Farms May Really Replace Coal Mining

Wind Power Ready To Replace Coal?

Europe Could Replace Oil with Offshore Wind Farms

Two New Studies on the Potential of Energy Efficiency

40% of World’s Electricity Will Come From Wind and Solar Power by …

Updated Resources Page and Info on UL Listing for Solar

SolarByTheWatt.com — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 08:25:39 +0000

We recently updated the Resources page. The SolarByTheWatt.com (Solar by the Watt) Resources page focuses on the most valuable information resources in the solar industry as opposed to the Renewable Energy Directory page which aims to be a more complete and extensive selection of a large list of Internet links to web sites of association, government agencies, commercial companies, news sites etc.

In the latest version of the Resources page we have interesting reference to information on UL listing of solar equipment.

SolarByTheWatt.com

The Power of Solar: How You Know It’s Right for Your Home

SolarByTheWatt.com — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 06:25:58 +0000

Solar power is becoming increasingly popular in homes and businesses. Solar how to books, websites and workshops are attracting huge audiences. The people interested in solar power are not just die-hard environmentalists. They are homeowners, business people and even government agencies.

Since at least the 1970s, people around the country have been concerned with the future of fossil fuels. These non-renewable resources are used extensively in every one of our daily activities. From eating breakfast to the morning commute to even taking a walk in the woods, fossil fuels have been involved. But because these resources are non-renewable, they will eventually run out.

When there is no more oil, coal or natural gas, we will need to rely on alternative fuels. One of the most promising alternative fuel sources is solar. How to harness solar power and make it work on a small scale is on the mind of many homeowners today.

There are countless benefits to be had with solar power. These are just a few:

* It can be used in new or existing homes. Solar panels can be built into new homes easily. They can also be added on to older homes as part of a “green” overhaul.

* The environmental impact of using solar is next to nothing. There is some impact from the production of solar panels. However, many factories are using alternative fuels themselves. Of those who still use fossil fuels, some purchase carbon offsets to reduce their overall impact. Actually using the panels to power your home produces no negative effects. There are no emissions or waste products to dispose of, and there is an unlimited supply of sunlight.

* If there is a power outage or natural disaster, having a solar power setup in place can help keep the lights on. After a power outage, it can take days to get your home’s power restored. Homes that live completely off the grid don’t have to wait around for the power company. Even homes with only a partial solar power system can keep essential items going with stored solar power. Your furnace, stove and battery charger can work even when your neighbors have no power.

* The financial benefits are plentiful, and they will only increase in the future. Fuel costs have suffered sharp rises recently. It seems likely that the cost of living will continue to climb higher and higher. For those who don’t have to pay for electricity, the lean times are easier to survive. Even if your home is only partially powered by solar, you will save a considerable amount of money on your electric bill. The initial cost of a solar setup may seem prohibitive, but it will pay for itself within a few years.

* The cost of solar power setups will likely continue to fall. The average cost of a home solar power setup today can be as high as $50,000 depending on the size of your home. That is the high-end cost, including materials and installation. If you do some or all of the work yourself and bargain shop for used solar panels, the price will be much lower. This price looks downright affordable when you look at costs in the past. Just a decade ago, the same setup could have cost upwards of $300,000. As the demand for solar power increases, so will production of solar panels. The price will fall accordingly, making solar power even more affordable to set up.

When it comes to powering your home with solar, how deep you dive in is up to you. You can have just one solar-powered appliance or a few collection panels on your roof. You can go completely off the grid all at once. Or you can switch to solar in stages. Changing over to renewable energy is a positive step for the future that you won’t regret.
About the Author

Video instructions for your next solar project. Solar How to information is free and available to you.

Lowest Solar Panel Prices Per Watt 2009-02-24

SolarByTheWatt.com — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 05:29:58 +0000

We are starting this a series of articles on lowest prices per watt for solar panels, modules where every time we have changes in the price ranking we will publish a new article with corresponding date in the title.

We list the lowest prices per watt that we can find on the internet and through direct research. We do not claim at all that these are research and results of an absolute character. That is, we realize that there might be products, vendors, pricing structures for certain types of projects and quantities that we are not able to identify through our effort.

That is why nobody should get offended that their product brand or vendor company is missed in our research or they are not ranked correctly because we have not found out about their lowest, low or otherwise competitive prices.

While we maintain that prices as dollar per Watt ($/Wp, dollar per Watt peak) is the number that will take the solar power industry to the stage of playing a major role of resolving the gigantic issues the US and the world have with securing clean, safe and abundant source of energy, we also realize that with many products groups prices reflect many other things than just willingness of the manufactures and the marketers to provide an affordable product.

Namely, different prices may reflect different quality and quality preference of the market – i.e. higher quality products would maintain relatively higher prices given all other factors being equal.

Different prices may reflect different costs to manufacture products of certain type of technology. We are well aware that this is especially true with solar panels. We will try, as effort grows to provide a way for our readers to be able to separate prices listed and researched for different underlying technologies of products.

In any case if any one buyer or seller of solar products thinks that our best research effort has not presented certain vendors, brand or price – please, feel free to contact us and forward to us details of the the product and price we should list. We will add additional level to research that such price is being offered on regular basis and will try to reflect this in our report.

Here is or current ranking:

($/Wp, $ per module, Wp of the module, nominal voltage, technology, Brand, Model, Vendor, URL to the vendor’s page)

$2.84 / Wp, $567.60, 200W, 18.1V, Poly-crystalline, Sun-A-200, SUN, KULLY Solar, http://kullysolar.com

$3.54 / Wp, $637, 180W, 24V, Poly-crystalline, CSI ECOSENSE CS6P-180, Canadian Solar, Affordable Solar Group LLC, http://www.affordable-solar.com

$3.56 / Wp, $142.49, 40W, 17.3V, Poly-crystalline, BP Solar, Discount Sales Electronics, http://discountsales.com

$3.83 / Wp, $230, 60W, 67V, Thin-film, Kaneka, GSA-60, Living Off The Grid, http://livingoffthegrid.ecrater.com

$3.94 / Wp, $630, 160W, 24.9V, Poly-crystalline, ES-160-A, Evergreen Solar, KULLY Solar, http://kullysolar.com

$4.62 / Wp, $1,016, 220W, 28.7V, Poly-crystalline, SCM220, REC Solar, Affordable Solar Group LLC, http://www.affordable-solar.com

$5.16 / Wp, $1,032, 200W, 55.8V, Mono-crystalline, HIP-200BA19, Sanyo, Affordable Solar Group LLC, http://www.affordable-solar.com

$5.48 / Wp, $328.88, 60W, 12V, Poly-crystalline, CD Tech Solar, RV Fun Products, http://www.rvfunproducts.com

$5.52 / Wp, $552, 100W, 18V, Mono-crystalline, SW100C, Sunwize, atlE Store, http://store.altenergystore.com

Please, be patient, we are adding more to this list. We are hoping the prices at the top of the list will reduce as we add more vendors. Feel free to send suggestions through comments on our articles or the Contact Us page.