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.

(jump directly to calculation tables)

We want to look at a very simple model of economic efficiency where are we interested in the annual return on investment. A project involving a solar photovoltaic installation requires certain amount of capital to be built and will expect certain amount of annual revenue. The simple indicator of efficiency that we want to study is this annual return on invested capital.

There are more complex models that also include the cost of capital. In a model that studies the cost of the electricity produced for example the cost of capital and factored in return for the investor could be very important factors. Cost of capital on its own can be a complex concept too. Whether the capital is borrowed and the cost will be defined by the interest rate of the loan or is cash participation from the investor and the cost will be defined by other opportunities the investor has to invest in (including risk free investments) or the combination of the two, cost of capital is very significant factor in such models.

We simplify our model to the level of looking at potential return from invested amount of capital. Further investment efficiency study and study on the cost of production of electricity should involve cost of capital.

We will also try to come to tables of calculated efficiency depending on different factors but not the size of the installation. The size of the installation definitely impacts the efficiency of a project. This is the traditional concept of economy if scales. A larger project will be expected to be more efficient over all because of the spread fixed expenses that the project has. But we will be building our model around the idea of dollar per watt, dollar per watt peak, so that it is applicable to different. The efficiency that comes from scale can be reflected in the factors going in to our model – specifically cost to build.

Another factor not included in our model is the maintenance cost of the solar installation. We are hoping that the reader can find resources which will indicate dollar per watt peak what the expected cost to maintain the station are.

The factors that expect to influence our model are: cost to build the power installation, insolation at the geographic location, electricity market price.

The cost to build the power installation includes:

• the price of the core photovoltaic components employed: modules, panels, arrays (what exactly list of such components we deal with depends on the design and configuration of the installation),
• the price of the mounting equipment (trackers and, or positioning frames) and wiring;
• price of inverters and grid connection equipment
• service and labor cost to assemble
• management and administration costs and costs of permits

The insolation at the geographic location. The insolation is the amount of solar light energy falling on the surface of the earth at a given geographic location per certain amount of area in the span of certain unit of time. More specifically the unit of measure used is watt per square meter (W/m²) or also kilowatt hour per square meter per day (kWh/m²/day). Insolation in Europe, just for reference purposes, approximately, ranges between 1,000 to 2,000 kWh per year per installed kWp, in the continental US – between 800 to 2,100 kWh per year per installed kWp for different regions. Exact numbers can be found in different reference tables and insolation maps on the internet and elsewhere.

In the photovoltaic industry a measure of insolation is employed which helps us more directly figure out how much electricity in kilowatt hours (kWh) we can produced annually from an installed nominal watt (Wp) – that is kilowatt hours annually per installed kWp (kWh/kWp/y).

The market price of the electricity produced. Since we are trying to figure out economic efficiency – annual return on investment we need to involve in the model:

• the price of the electricity we produce and sell to the grid

or conversely

• the price of the amount of electricity we offset that we were otherwise going to pay for at such market price.

In many places in the world – by country or by specific territory (state, other subdivision) there are financial incentives for investors in photovoltaic power stations in the way of a special feed-in-tariff. These usually are higher price the grid pays to energy producers who utilize photovoltaic power stations. If we have to give some examples these countries have the following feed-in-tariffs (unit of measure is Euros per kWh since classically many of the notable incentives started in Europe and that is the currency used there): Austria 0.57 – 0.59, Germany 0.52 – 0.57, Italy, 0.36 – 0.49, France 0.30 – 0.55, Spain 0.19 – 0.44, Switzerland 0.10 – 0.50, Israel 0.14 – 0.16, Bulgaria 0.40.

The formula.

The annual return on investment in a solar power station will be the annual income from sold (or offset electricity) divided by the amount of the investment.

Annual return on investment = annual income ($) / investment amount ($).

The annual income is the market price of the electricity in dollar ($) per kilowatt hour (kWh) times the amount of energy produced in an year in kilowatt hours (kWh).

Annual income ($) = production per year (kWh) x market price ($/kWh)

The production per year is the solar insolation in kilowatt hours per year per kilowatt peak installed times the installed capacity/power in kilowatt peak (kWp).

Production per year (kWh) = insolation (kWh/y/kWp) x installed capacity (kWp) .

So that we can work on dollar per watt basis we will express the investment amount by the investment cost per watt.

Investment amount ($) = total cost per watt ($/Wp) x installed capacity (kWp) x 1,000

– the 1,000 factor  is to adjust the dollar per watt unit to the kWp in which we are measuring the installed power.

So the complete formula for the annual return on investment will be:

Annual return on investment = annual income ($) / investment amount ($)

If we use the formula for the annual income we get:

= production per year (kWh) x market price ($/kWh) / (total cost per watt ($/Wp) x installed capacity (kWp) x 1,000)

If we use the formula for the production per year we come to:

= insolation (kWh/y/kWp) x installed capacity (kW) x market price ($/kWh) / (total cost per watt ($/Wp) x installed capacity (kWp) x 1,000)

Here we can get rid of the installed capacity (kWp) in the numerator and denominator and get to:

Annual return on investment
= insolation (kWh/y/kWp)   x   market price ($/kWh)
/  ( total cost per watt ($/Wp)   x   1,000 )

Let’s use the formula in an example where $7 per watt were spend in the building of the station, the insolation is 1,200 kWh per installed kWp and there is a $0.52 feed-in-tariff for the electricity produced.

Annual return on investment = 1,200 x 0.52 / (7 x 1,000) = 624 / 7,000 = 8.92%.

This calculated rate now can be compared to cost of capital and maintenance cost can be factored in to look for some more complete number of real economic return.

In addition to this formula the following tables can be used to get to approximate numbers:

The first table is given for insolation of 1,000 (this can be easily factored if we know the specific insolation, i.e. for 1,500 we just have to multiply by 1.5, for 2,200 we simply multiply by 2.2, etc.)

The investment cost per watt is given in a very wide range of $3 to $10 per watt but it is not implied that these are possible, practical or easy to obtain prices in reality. Our research shows that large industrial project can reach down to $6 per watt of such cost and smaller commercial and residential projects can go up to $10 and even $15 per watt peak installed.

The price for kWh of electricity is given in a range of $0.05 to $0.60 to reflect different market prices for electric energy and all possible feed in tariffs.

Annual Return on Investment At Insolation of 1,000 kWh/kWp:

Annual Return on Investment At Insolation of  1,500 kWh/kWp:

Annual Return on Investment At Insolation of 2,000 kWh/kWp:

To factor in the cost of capital  in the numbers from these tables one needs to subtract the cost of capital as a percentage. For example if the cost of capital is 4%  that has to be subtracted from the numbers in the tables above. Similar adjustment can be made for to factor in the maintenance costs.

Configuration efficiency, (performance ratio). We do not know whether this term is discussed in other research in length but we want to mention it for this reason: projects with equal labeled peak power – watt peak (Wp), nominal power, if taken directly from the labeled peak power of the modules involved can have different overall output electricity production – kilowatt hour (kWh) per year at the same geographic location. This could be because of how different modules perform when positioned with trackers or mounted stationary, or how well they perform in different cloud conditions etc. etc. So, realistically the nominal installed power (Wp) that can be used with insolation numbers to figure out annual production can be different for different installations mainly because of the type of modules used a the specific conditions (insolation, cloudiness, positioning etc.) For the different projects this factor has to be specifically researched based on data from similar configuration used in existing projects. By information we can get to such factor can vary between 0.75 and 1.4 – i.e. the electricity produced in a year from the installation in kWh may vary from the above calculation for known insolation from –25% to +40% from the indicated.

Related Articles:

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

Can Solar Energy Completely Replace Fossil Fuel and Other Sources?

A Short Science Lesson for Journalists – Watts, Kilowatts, Megawatts, Kilowatt Hours

Lowest Solar Panel Prices Per Watt 2009-02-24

Resources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photovoltaic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insolation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed-in_Tariff

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PV_financial_incentives

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.

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SolarByTheWatt.com

By TJ Greene. In this day and age with the ever-increasing cost of everything from gas to groceries, we’re all searching for for ways to cut back on the outflow of money.

One of the areas with the biggest jumps in costs is home energy. Who looks forward to that monthly electric bill? Not me, not you or anyone else because that bill gets bigger every single month. And it’s not going to get any better.

And yes there are ways to conserve some of your money as you help the environment also. And yes it’s the “green method”, which doesn’t bring up thoughts of communal living or mother earth nuts that it used to. More and more people just like you and I are looking for ways to save money and one of those ways is to stop paying for electricity by generating our own.

By constructing your own wind turbine to create all the electrical power you need..renewable wind energy is now the fastest growing source of energy around the globe. And stop what you’re thinking…it’s not that difficult to build your own…and really a lot easier than many wind generator companies would like you to believe!

To put it simply…it’s cheaper to build a electricity-generating wind turbine of your own and get the rewards for doing so YEARS before you’d get the benefits from a over-priced wind generator that you bought from a company.. And the technology is very basic! You can build your own renwable energy source for under $500. That’s something utility companies and most renewable energy companies that “offer” you renewable solutions for thousands of dollars, don’t want you to know.

The materials you need to construct a wind generator: the DC motor, batteries, towers and hub, are very inexpensive – you can build your own wind generator for under $500 and there are programs to sell back the excess energy you create to your power company. A professional installation from a energy generating construction company can run into the thousands of dollars, making it years before your system can pay for itself. Not the case when you’re doing it yourself.

There are also federal government programs that can help you pay for these energy-saving additions for your home or business.

Other governments and smart people in the United States are putting together their own wind-generated turbine systems everyday. And more are constructed daily which means more people are finally realizing what a very smart investment it is, and how it PAYS to do it!

The main problem I’ve seen across the internet to building your wind turbine is that these people who are doing it themselves are making it more difficult than it has to be, and they are spending too much money building their own electricity-generating wind turbine system.

So…don’t you think it’s about the time YOU became more aware of the future of renewable energy and started planning your OWN wind-generating turbine? And what about solar panels laid out on your home or property to collect the energy from the sun, which again takes you off the meter of the power company?

Come on…it’s time all of us begin taking care of our futures by removing ourselves from fossil-burning energy consumption. You only have to take that first step!

About the Author

By TJ Greene.  TJ asks:  How would you like to unplug your house from your electrical company, knowing that you are “100% Powered By Nature” with renewable energy? Take few minutes a look at these tips to “stop paying for electricity”! You’ll be surprised at how easy it is to change over and you’ll breathe a little easier at night knowing you’re doing your part to stop the consumption of fossil fuels!

Related articles on the web:

New BiFeO3 Crystal Can Improve Solar Cells Efficiency & Price

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Rise & Shine: February 23, 2009

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SolarByTheWatt.com