Entrepreneur Needed for Winter Solar Power Fix
“…in regions where homeowners have long rolled their eyes at shoveling driveways, add another cold-weather chore: cleaning off the solar panels. “At least I can get to them with a long pole and a squeegee,” said Alan Stankevitz, a homeowner in southeast Minnesota.” As he patiently squeegees off his stationary solar panels, day, after day, after day, throughout the long arduous winter in Minnesota…
Do you just accept this story as further proof that “it isn’t easy being green”? Do you see no alternative for this poor man but to just go out there and work this backbreaking labor for green energy? Do I hear you snort derisively?
Or… are you able to think creatively? Come on; give me your ideas for solving this. How hard would it be to plan for this kind of weather condition? Couldn’t cold weather solar providers offer a solution to this problem? I can see two very easy possible fixes right away. What solutions can you think of?
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Caveat. Renewable solutions do not utilize fossil power. Let me know your ideas in the comments. Maybe you will start the little startup that makes millions off that solution… and we at Cleantechnica can write about your idea in a few years.
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The market for this snowy climate solar solution should be good, because:
“On the other hand, the panels can get extra power from sunlight reflected off nearby snow. And like other electronic gear, solar panels work better when cold.
Mr. Stankevitz said that on some rare winter days, when the Minnesota sky is clear, the weather is freezing and the sun is shining brightly, his panels can briefly churn out more electricity than they were designed to produce, more than on the balmiest days of summer.”
Image from Day Creek Journal
Story from the New York Times
A much larger problem is keeping heavy snow and ice dams off roofs. The only solution that I know of is heat. That’s hardly efficient. However unlike roofs, solar panels don’t need to be fixed. Simply tilt them. Nice and easy with a lever and fulcrum.
Yeah - the fixed panels jumped out at me too!
Good post!
I think that a combination of temperature sensors and heat, along with back-and-forth tilting would be a good first step! Software would be the essential component to tie all of the technologies together
Well… Not that complex an issue really. If the solar panels are on a roof I would route the vents through the space between a double layer of glass over the panels. The heat would insure the snow would just melt off. If the panels are not roof mounted simply place the same sort of heating strips that are found in the rear view window of cars (well, at least around here in Scandinavia) which simply heats the window a bit. It should be able to run without being a big draw on the system. Other options of course are panels that just flip out when the sun is out and fold over when the sun is down or the sky is clouded over. Make them flip in such a way that the weight of the snow on them helps out and balance them so that it requires minimum effort to flip them back.
Or put shutters on them.
The possibilities are really endless.
So why not just do what car manufacturers did with windshield wipers? Attach a wiper blade/squeege to the top and sensor on the panel and when a certain amount of snow falls on it, the wiper automatically pushes off the snow. You could just use the energy from the panel itself to power the sensor and wiper, so no external energy is needed. Seems easy enough (but then again I’m no engineer….)
I am thinking a set of Chromed Alum. mini blind system with at least 6 inches of clearance between the blinds and the face of the Solar Panels would work. With the clearance it would allow for heavier snow at times and then just open the blinds either manualy or via solar powered energy source each morning. The reflective glare of the louvers will allow the little amount of snow left on them to melt off due to the reflective facing of the louvers. Any snow on them will fall to the ground when they are opened thus the need for the 6 inch clearance, or more of you want. Just a thought.
What great ideas.
“If the solar panels are on a roof I would route the vents through the space between a double layer of glass over the panels. The heat would insure the snow would just melt off.”
You mean the heat being expelled from the home,right?
“heating strips that are found in the rear view window of cars which simply heats the window a bit”
That’s another great idea. I wonder - could the solar power for the day keep those little window heat strips warm overnight?
“why not just do what car manufacturers did with windshield wipers? Attach a wiper blade/squeege to the top and sensor on the panel and when a certain amount of snow falls on it, the wiper automatically pushes off the snow.” - this sounds like it could work too.
Use round PV and have them slowly rotate when it’s snowing. Best of all, since snow is white more sunlight will be bounced right into the PV tubes. Round PV should already be on a white surface in the first place though.
Sounds to me like too many people have not lived in MN (I live in MN.) Its NOT a simple problem to solve. We frequently have freeze-on-contact rain and freeze/melt cycles which can make even a simple hinge lock up or crack. Wipers on our cars are glued down routinely and require work to free up.
Phase changing water from solid to liquid takes HUGE amounts of energy; its laughable to think of melting snow off solar panels.
Rotating panels to dump snow is a nice idea and works much of the time; except for ICE formation. There is currently no easy solution for all situations (easiest being squeegee + warm water for deicing.)
I’ve thought if I ever wanted to spend that kind of money, I would devise a clever roll up tarp that would cover it up and pull off the snow on the tarp as it rolled in. This wouldn’t solve everything but could automate most the situations. That ‘tarp’ might have to be metal…
I have thought about this problem as a pre-req for me doing solar in MN. Best I could come up with is in my previous post.
More detail:
At the bottom of the panels is a pipe that has a motor attached to it and it rolls in a tarp or metal sheeting. The end of the sheet would have a board attached at 90 degrees (facing up) to help the tarp pull the snow down when it rolls up the tarp. The trick in this involves cheaply keeping the protective tarp from rubbing the solar panels when it has snow on it. Rails are not ideal due to complexity/cost; same with a garage door system, which would obviously not roll up nicely but if you had the space you could adapt a garage door and components to avoid any fabrication.
I’ve been leaning towards tensioned cables to lower material costs and less issues with ice jamming that rails cause.
The choice of covering design somewhat determines how you rig up the mechanism to pull it back up again. But not so difficult that it needs consideration at this point.
Benefits:
fully automated
low power use to slide any amount of snow/ice off
low power to protect it
hale protection
Downside:
You have to switch it on or have a sensor trigger it.
MN weather changes frequently; can’t just use internet weather info to trigger it; can’t use low light/output either.
Material costs to make it able to handle X amount of snow load without touching the panels– supporting framework as well… (which is why I’m looking at tensioned cables and with less width per unit.)