How Do Solar Panels Heat Water

Choosing to heat your water using solar power is a wise choice and a first step in making a choice to help preserve our environment.

How do solar panels heat water.

Solar panels or photovoltaic cell technology has come a long way in the last seven decades to produce enough electricity to power a home in the second decade of the 21st century. One of the most complex and often confusing areas of solar power in recent times has been the plethora of options available for heating water in any home. Using solar hot water for space heating won t supply 100 percent of your heating needs. In the simplest panels sun heats water flowing in a circuit through the collector the panel on your roof.

The sun s thermal energy heats the fluid in the solar collectors. Where solar electric systems use the sun s energy to generate power for your home like your refrigerator or lights solar water heating systems pump hot water heated by the sun into your home. Solar water heaters use the energy of the sun to give hot water. The traditional hot water heater can be powered by the sun or combined with a solar thermal hot water system or with a tankless system.

In order to ensure a safe temperature at the taps a tempering valve will reduce the temperature to around 45 degrees. Here s a simple summary of how rooftop solar hot water panels work. Solar thermal collectors directly turn the sun s energy into heat where it s collected and tranferred to a hot water tank in your home. We know how easy it is to use solar power to do a lot of things including heating our water.

It provides hot water for your bath as well as in the kitchen and washing machine. One solar heater is sufficient for the entire house. The water leaving the collector is hotter than the water entering it and carries its heat toward your hot water tank. The temperature of the water may exceed 60 degrees celsius a requirement to kill bacteria.

Choosing a solar water heating system. An immersion heater unvented hot water cylinder might be needed as a back up heater or to get the water to the temperature you want. You ll still need a supplemental heat source so you won t be able to scrap your furnace or boiler. Solar water heating systems are different than solar electric systems.

Closed loop or indirect systems use a non freezing liquid to transfer heat from the sun to water in a storage tank. As heat rises the hot water delivering to the tank from the solar collector comes from the top for use in the house. Then this fluid passes through a heat exchanger in the storage tank transferring the heat to the water. This is then used to heat your water which is stored in a hot water cylinder.

On average it can heat water up to 212 f though you won t require more than 130 f.