Most people don’t realize how much the solar panel industry has grown in the last several years. The United States alone spends more than $17 billion on solar power every single year! All signs point to solar panels becoming more and more common within only the next few years.
But why is there so much demand for solar panel manufacturing? And how does solar panel manufacturing work?
As solar power becomes more popular, more people want to know how the manufacturing process for solar power systems functions. Read on to learn all about solar panel manufacturing and why solar panels provide as much value as they do!
Where Does the Solar Industry Manufacture Panels?
Most people do not know that most solar panels come from different countries in Asia. However, that may not stay the case in the future. Both the United States and Europe are investing more in solar panel manufacturing at home.
Not only does this allow them to compete with Asia, but it allows them to take advantage of some of the benefits of the manufacturing system within the United States and Europe. Some of the best solar panels in the world come from the United States.
What Goes Into a Solar Energy System?
So what are the ingredients required to create solar panels? Solar panels are made out of glass, metal, silicon, and polysilicon.
The solar PV cells in solar panels are the most important part of the recipe because they are the part that transforms energy from the Sun into electrical power. The solar cells themselves are made out of silicon and protected by layers of glass.
How Different Types of Solar Panels Are Made
There are a couple of different kinds of solar panels. P-type solar panels are the older and more traditional kind.
They have a base that is positively charged, which means that it lacks electrons. To create such a base, they have a bottom layer that is made out of boron.
However, to function correctly, solar panels need multiple layers. Some of those layers need to be positive and some of those layers need to be negative. Along with the positive layer of boron on the bottom, these kinds of solar panels have negative layers made out of phosphorus as well.
The other main kind of solar panel is the N-type cell. Instead of having a layer of boron on the bottom, it has a layer of phosphorus. For a variety of reasons, this allows this more modern kind of solar panel to provide increased efficiency.
That increase in efficiency is one of the main reasons that solar panels are becoming more and more viable as economic competitors to traditional sources of energy.
One of the main ways that this design increases efficiency is by withstanding excess exposure to sunlight. It may sound paradoxical, but traditional solar panels produced less electricity when they were exposed to too much sun at the same time.
Modern Panel Advantages
Modern solar panels produce more electricity when exposed to as much sun as possible rather than less.
On top of solar panels, manufacturers apply a coating that does not reflect sunlight. That way, instead of sunlight hitting a solar panel and then bouncing away, it is captured.
When this sunlight hits the positive or negative layers in the solar panel, it knocks electrons from one layer to another. That provides the energy to create an electrical current.
Of course, a single solar cell may not provide very much electricity. That is why standard solar power systems consist of dozens of solar cells linked together. However, these larger systems consist only of copies of the same basic design over and over again.
Why Now Is the Right Time for Residential Solar Panel Installation
Solar panels are more valuable when traditional sources of energy are more expensive. In particular, solar panels at home are more valuable when all sources of energy from the electrical grid are more expensive.
There are a number of reasons that publicly available energy is becoming more and more expensive. First, access to traditional energy is diminishing because of international unrest. The less oil and natural gas we have available, the more people have to pay for a dwindling supply.
On top of that, we are going through a period of significant inflation. People are finding that their bills go up and up from month to month, including their energy bills.
Last of all, people are consuming more electricity than in the past. Most people don’t realize that the air conditioner can sometimes be responsible for half of the electrical consumption of an entire household. In recent years, hotter summers have led people to depend more and more on their air conditioners to maintain comfort at home.
The combination of these three factors means that buying energy is more expensive than ever.
The Best Solar Panels Provide Improved Efficiency
On the other hand, technology continues to advance. Modern solar panels are more efficient, providing more electricity generated from the same quantity of sunlight. If you evaluate your bills, you may find that solar panel installation pays for itself within only a few years!
As energy prices go up, so does the value of the electricity that comes out of a residential solar power system.
On top of that, generating electricity at home means leaving more energy for everyone else. People who cannot afford solar panel systems will be able to buy electricity at somewhat lower rates as more and more people find ways to generate electricity on their own.
Understand What Solar Panel Manufacturing Looks Like
As solar power becomes more common, more and more people are getting interested in how solar panel manufacturing works. Once you appreciate how solar panels work, you can better understand why so many people get so much value out of them. The circumstances of today combined with the improving technology of solar panels are helping the solar power industry to grow.
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