Renewable Energy

Photovoltaic
The word Photovoltaic consists of the two Greek words for light and the name of the physicist Alessandro Volta. It thus describes the direct transformation of the sunlight into electricity through the use of solar cells.

Solar thermal energy
The term solar thermal energy describes the transformation of sunlight into usable warmth. This warmth can then be used to produce hot water or assist heating systems.

What is meant by the term solar technology?
To the public, solar technology simply means the transformation of the sun’s energy into electricity. Taking into account the fact that the amount of energy transmitted every two minutes to the earth’s surface by the sun is enough to meet the needs of the planet’s population for an entire day, solar technology has been designated as a renewable energy source. With a prospective lifespan of 5 billion years the sun presents itself as a nearly inexhaustible source of energy. “Tapping” this energy source is dependent only on geographic location, the time of day, the weather and the season. The use of the sun as an energy source reaches far back into history.
Though its proactive exploitation is a recent development, its passive use was already readily visible in the architecture of the Egyptians. It was in 1839 that Henry Bequerel discovered the so-called photoelectric effect, which served as the catalyst for development of today’s solar cells. The supplied light and warmth in these cells release positive and negative charge carriers through the photoelectric effect.

Why solar technology?
In Germany alone 5.2 million square meters of solar thermal collectors have already been built. This has already led to a decrease in yearly consumption of fuel oil by 200 million liters. The positive effects of this on the environment are readily apparent.

Funding (fed-in compensation)
The law giving precedence to renewable energies has served to fix remuneration for solar energy. Energy providers and operators of plants built after 2007 must by law pay 45.7 cents per kwh for solar energy. This remuneration is ensured for 20 years from start-up. For facilities and soundproofing there is a remuneration of 57.4 cents per kwh below 30 kw and above 30kw a remuneration of 54.6 cents per kwh.