GENERATION OF SOLAR POWER SYSTEM

tholluwacoded (36)in #science • 8 years ago

Solar power is an alternative form of energy production been researched to replace coal and natural gas used to generate electricity today, it is the safer means of production in terms of environmental hazards because sunlight does not produces greenhouse gases which prevent global warming . In addition while the coal and gas are both limited supply within the earth-crust, sunlight will never face issue since it is naturally occurring environmental event.
Photovoltaic cells are made of semiconductor materials such as silicon, when light strikes the cell; a certain portion of it is absorbed within the semiconductor.
The energy knocks electrons loose, allowing them to flow freely. PV cells also have one or more electric field that acts to force electrons freed by light absorption to flow in a certain direction. This flow of electrons is a current, and by placing metal contacts on the top and bottom of the PV cells. A photovoltaic system typically includes an array of solar panels, an inverter, and sometimes a battery.
When light particles are incident on each solar cell in the array made of two layers of semi-conductor material, some of the protons from the sunlight are absorb by the semi-conductor atoms freely electrons from the cell’s negative layer to flow in an external circuit and back into the positive layer, this flow of electrons produces electric current which is then passed from the photovoltaic array through conductor to the charge controller.

TYPES OF ENERGY GENERATION
WIND ENERGY: Wind energy is the one that is obtained from the wind, it is a kinetic energy generated by the effect of wind current or the vibration produced by the wind. Wind energy is related with the movement of air masses displacing in high atmospheric pressure area towards low pressure and the economic impact of wind energy is low.

GEOTHERMAL ENERGY: Geothermal energy is obtained from seizing upon the heat of the inner part of the earth, this heat is due to several factors among which the geothermal gradient heat stand. Geothermal can be obtained by extracting earth inner heat.

NUCLEAR ENERGY: Nuclear energy is an industrial facility used for generating electricity, it is characterized by using the fissionable materials which passes through nuclear reaction yield heat. This heat is used by a conventional thermodynamic cycle which moves to the alternator and produces electricity.

PHOTOVOLTAIC SOLAR ENERGY: Photovoltaic (PV) is the name of a method of converting Solar energy into direct current electricity using semiconducting materials that exhibit the photovoltaic effect, a phenomenon commonly studied in physics. Photovoltaic power capacity is measured as maximum power output under standardized test conditions watts. Installations may be ground-mounted (and sometimes integrated with farming and grazing) or built into the roof or walls of a building.

The array of a photovoltaic power systems, or PV system, produces direct current (DC) power which fluctuates with the sunlight's intensity. For practical use this usually requires conversion to certain desired voltages or alternating current (AC), through the use of inverter. Photovoltaic are best known as a method for generating electric power by using solar cells to convert energy from the sun into a flow of electrons.

APPLICATIONS OF SOLAR POWER SYSTEM
• HOMES – The use of solar power is quite increasing in homes, Residential appliances can easily be use electricity to generate through solar power. Solar power system are used in homes for electronic of electrical appliances to meet the need of the users.

• COMMERCIAL USE – They are installed on roofs of different building, these panels collect solar energy from the sun and convert it to electricity and also allows offices to use their own electrical power for different purposes.

• SOLAR LIGHTING – These light are also known as day lighting and it works with use of solar power, these light stores energy through the solar panel during day time and it convert it to energy into electricity to light up during night time.

ELECTRICAL COMPONENTS OF A SOLAR POWER SYSTEM
• Solar panel
• Charge controller
• Battery
• Inverter

SOLAR PANEL
Solar panel refers either to a solar hot water panel, a common type of a solar thermal collector, or to one or more solar photovoltaic (PV) modules, electrically connected and mounted on a supporting structure. Solar panel use light energy from the sun to generate electricity through photovoltaic effect. The structural member of module can neither be the top layer or black layer. The majority of modules use wafer biased crystalline silicon cells or thin-film cells-crystalline silicon.

CHARGE CONTROLLER
A charge controller or a charge regulator is basically a voltage or current regulator to keep the batteries from over charging, Charge controller prevents overcharging and may protect against over voltage which may reduce the performance of the battery and may pose a safety risk, it may also prevent draining or perform controlled discharges, depending on the battery technology to protect battery life span.

BATTERY
A solar battery is the one that receives its energy from the sun through the use of photovoltaic, In some cases a solar powered battery is implanted in an electronics devices that are not capable of been removed. A solar battery is usually capable of charging after just an hour or two of exposure to sunlight, the evidence of a solar battery is an array of solar cells that is usually in line or block.

INVERTERS
A power inverter, or inverter, is an electronic device or circuitry that changes direct current (DC) to alternating current (AC).The input voltage, output voltage and frequency, and overall power handling depend on the design of the specific device or circuitry. The inverter does not produce any power; the power is provided by the DC source. A power inverter can be entirely electronic or may be a combination of mechanical effects (such as a rotary apparatus) and electronic circuitry.