Advantages of Solar Power System
Advantages of Solar Power System
The solar power system is an eco-friendly technology that generates green power during the daytime by converting solar irradiations into electricity. The solar power system consists of integrated electrical and mechanical components connected and installed to produce the optimal electricity amount economically.
In particular, electrical components of the solar power system are solar panels, controllers, inverters, batteries, cables, metering, and monitoring devices. The mechanical parts stand for mounting structures, battery racks, AC/DC combiner boxes. The selection and the sizing of the components depend on the project specs recorded and analyzed within the engineering phase.
Types of the solar power system:
- Off-Grid solar system: Stand-alone system is independent without connection to the electricity grid. The solar panels generate DC electrical current then stored in battery backup to be converted to AC via an inverter and used during the night or on some cloudy or rainy days. This system has high demand in remote areas of residential and commercial sectors.
- On-Grid solar system: The grid-tie system is the most balanced in electricity production and consumption. Accordingly, the end-user does not face a power cut since the shortage in the production compensates by withdrawing electricity from the grid. On the other hand, the overproduction balances by injecting the surplus into the grid. The initial investment of the on-grid systems is the lowest among the other types because there is no need for battery backup or diesel generators in some applications.
- Hybrid solar system: Hybrid solar system is a combination of the best from the grid-tie and off-grid solar system. The solar panels generate power like the grid-tie solar system and use hybrid solar inverters and batteries to store energy for later use after the production shortage.
Advantages of solar power systems
Solar technologies positively impact the three pillars of sustainability: environment, economic and social.
- Infinite Energy Source: Earth never runs out of solar irradiation, which is the fuel of the solar power systems. Solar rays are accessible as long as we have the sun during the daytime and the amount of solar irradiation varies based on the geographical location.
- Green Energy: Solar systems generate electricity with ZERO GHG emissions. It’s safe and clean compared with traditional power production. The systems running on solar power are less polluted and eco-friendly.
- Muteness power generation: This sort of power system generates electricity in silence mode. It is better for residential applications while systems operate without any noise.
- Cost-saving: Since solar power systems generate electricity using natural fuel, the End-User does not have to pay electricity bills. The systems’ cost is the initial investment depending on the installed power capacity. The additional advantage is the average payback time to remunerate the investments is up to two or three years. Even the customer can generate profit from selling the surplus electricity to the government.
- Low on-going cost: The End-User does not have to pay much money during operations and maintenance because the lifespan of each electrical device is longer than the investment’s payback. The financial risk is lower than the other renewable energy technologies. For example, most solar manufacturers give a 20-25 years warranty on solar panels and a 3-5 years guarantee on the inverters, and the same for the batteries.
- Growth of economy: These systems are high diffusion technologies in the renewable energy market that create new business opportunities and require hiring different laborers’ categories to perform in the project management stages, starting from the design until the projects’ hand over, and during the maintenance.
- High return on investment (ROI): After reaching the payback period, the End-User starts to generate profits in the long run from ZERO bills payment.