Who Killed the Solar Water Heater?
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Post time:03/13/2012
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Solar hot water - also known as solar thermal technology - technology has been around for a long time. However, its effectiveness has not led to a widespread adoption in the United States. Why you ask?
As a brief overview, solar hot water systems do not generate electricity as a photovoltaic (PV) system. Instead, they use the thermal energy of the Sun to heat the water directly, without going through the stage of electricity generation. This has important implications for the construction of energy efficiency. Solar thermal technology can be used to heat water, heating and cooling of premises. Solar water heaters, however, are the most common application of solar thermal technology. In a Word, can be heavily: in comparison with photovoltaic panels, solar hot water systems have relatively low start-up costs and often offer shorter recovery periods.
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Solar hot water systems are very popular in the late 1970s and early 1980s, once he saw the 1973 energy crisis. Partly in response to rising oil prices, the President Carter Administration established rebates and other incentives to encourage the adoption of renewable energy systems. During this time, there were up to 500 U.S. solar water heating equipment manufacturers. This number was reduced to a mere five, however, once the federal Government reduced incentive programs.
The Government is not the only factor behind solar water heaters decrease ' fast. The industry grew rapidly and without much control, a combination that led to a series of installations of low quality and low performance systems. As a result, solar water heating has a bad reputation for being ineffective. Understandably, a technology which has least affordable suddenly (because of the incentives cut), and is perceived as less reliable, quickly fell out of favor.
As a result, new systems were rare in the United States until the 2000s, when renewable energy saw the growing interest of consumers and politicians. The few companies that have been in the business of solar thermal energy for the long term have focused on solar heating for swimming pools, a small market that allowed them to resist long decline of their industry. The current market looks more promising, though, so we are waiting for this great renewable energy option can recoup some of its previous popularity.
