Most family homes spend around a third of their energy budget on heating water for daily uses. Heating water for showers, baths, cleaning clothes and a host of other things is done by electricity or gas supplied by utility companies. However the resources that are used to create this electricity or gas are not renewable and are proving increasingly harder to find as more is used up. This puts the pinch on the average household consumer that is finding utility bills steadily going up at above inflation figures.
This will only continue as fossil fuels get harder to find and extract. Thus consumers, governments and even the companies that supply electricity are looking for alternatives that are less harmful to the environment and are a renewable resource. Solar power is a good way to heat water and has been successful for close to 100 years now. This article will discuss cover how you can save money on your household energy bills by installing a solar power water boiler.
Using the sun to heat water has been used for thousands of years. It is still one of the more popular ways to use solar energy even today and the basic principle remains the same. It is simply a matter of placing water in a location where it can be exposed to the suns thermal rays. There are two common approaches to doing this.
They are called the flat plate collector and batch collector systems. Flat plate collectors are better described as a system of piping that is located on the roof so that it comes into contact with direct sunlight. Water is passed through the piping from a storage tank.
During this process the water is heated by the thermal heat. The piping and the backing of the system are designed to make maximum use of the thermal heat passed by the sun. The heated water can then be pased into the homes plumbing system or to another storage tanks or back to the original tank. A batch collector system is a specially made water tank that will absorb the thermal heating provided by the sun and thus heat the water stored in the tank.
This water can then be used in the home. The tank is placed in a position where it can get maximum exposure to sunlight. The solar heated water is passed into the regular plumbing system of the home where it can be used to have hot showers or baths or wash the dishes. The home will still rely on electricity to heat the water but solar heated water will be hotter than ordinary water and this will take a lot less electricity to get it to a usage temperature. This will lower your energy bills over time. Many people may be put off by the initial cost of installing a solar power hot water system however the costs have come down considerably over the years.
If you factor in that it has very few maintenance costs and can last up to 20 years then there is a good chance that you will be saving money. The initial cost will take about 5 years to recover on saved energy bills. This leaves up to 15 years of energy savings.
You are also being more environmentally responsible as there is less greenhouse gases being produced using this system.
For more information on solar water heating visit www.solarpowerappliances.com. You will also find swimming pool solar heating systems and solar outdoor lighting.
