What solar equipment is necessary to power a steam generator for a home steam bath?

The generator I have is rated at 12 KW, requires 220V and 33Amp service to heat a room of 500 cubic feet. The power is only needed periodically and for short periods of time, 30 – 60 minutes a day. (on a rare occasion, twice a day.) How do I plan, organize and calculate the required equipment?

You want to power it with Photovoltaic panels?
Or are you asking about passive solar pre-heaters?

If you are going to buy Photovoltaic panels, just call up a install firm and get some. There is a 30% tax credit for them now even. But why you are specifically tying the PV panels into your sauna is just confusing. It would sure make for an expensive sauna.

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Yes, they are legit: read this article:

If you’ve ever found yourself without power in the middle of a storm, especially with today’s unpredictable weather patterns, you may have also wondered whether it would be worthwhile investment.

Who would find the technology of a solar power generator useful?

There are many benefits of having a solar generator available for powering the necessities and even those things you just want to function when you’re experiencing a power outage.

Reasons to have a solar power generator might include:

Life support – An elderly person, child, or person who is on oxygen or other life supporting machines that require power
Being able to power appliances, cook, work, and function normally during a power outage
Medical facilities can power essential equipment during a power outage, saving lives and preserving supplies
Saving on food – Residents lose hundreds of dollars and restaurants lose thousands of dollars of food every year when a natural disaster strikes and they are without power to keep the refrigerator and freezer operational. A solar generator would save a lot of money.
Solar power generators can be used virtually anywhere including in a home, business, boat, cabin, tent, desert, and many other climates and locations throughout the world.
Solar generators are available in several sizes and wattages. Your purpose for having a solar generator and the number of watts you’ll need to keep your home or business up and running will determine how big your generator will need to be and how much it will cost.

The general rule of thumb when considering the cost of a solar generator is to assume the more wattage it produces, the more money it will cost to purchase.

Cost of Solar Powered Generators

The most expensive part of a solar powered generator is the solar panel system. The power inverter and the deep cycle batteries required to operate a solar generator aren’t as expensive, but necessary.

The price range for a solar powered generator varies from a mere $30.00 all the way up to a whopping $50,000.

If you want to recharge your camera or small hand-held device, the small generator at the price point of around $30 will be just right. However, if you are looking to power an entire building or home that has no power at all, you should expect to spend up to $50,000 for a solar generator that can handle the job.

The price range for a small generator would run between $750 and $2,100. This is the most popular size and the most affordable for most people.

Portable solar powered generators can be very small, as in a few inches across. However, the larger units can run as large as 20 feet long and would need special transportation to get it to its destination.

No matter what size generator you have, it must be installed in a location where it gets direct sunlight whenever possible. The greatest disadvantage of solar power generators of course, is that they do require direct sunlight to be able to convert and store the sun’s energy for later use.

Cloudy days or extended periods of inclement weather will prevent you from being able to recharge your generator.

Despite the drawbacks, a generator powered by the sun is an excellent supplemental power source or a great alternative power source in the case of an emergency.

A follow-up to my last question about microwave generators.

If we had a solar powered device capable of producing radiation only in the UVB band, and it were directed straight up, would this cause the stratosphere to heat due to the higher concentration of ozone there?

And if so, then since the device is solar powered and is essentially ‘stealing’ energy from the sun that would have otherwise gone into warming the surface, it will have the effect of redistributing solar energy from the surface to the stratosphere.

So if enough of these devices are built on a large enough scale, would that "rebalance" the energy imbalance caused by global warming (where the upper atmosphere is cooling and lower atmosphere is warming) and eventually bring both tropospheric and stratospheric temperatures back to preindustrial levels, even without worrying about CO2?

Don’t worry about practicality, I am just wondering if the physics add up or if there’s some key piece I’m missing.

since the oceans are absorbing 95% of the energy, i don’t think so.

clearly if you could cover 1/2 the oceans with mirrors, you’d be able to reverse global warming.
but you’d create an environmental disaster in the process.
we’ve already reduced fish stocks to critical levels in much of the ocean.
depriving the remaining ocean of sunlight would reduce algae and all of the fish that depend on it.

so the 2 problems are,
1. scale, it really is not scalable to the size needed, and
2. location, it doesn’t lend itself to being deployed where the problem is most serious.

Assume that the albedo of the solar panel is equal to the albedo of the surrounding land, and that the generator is not a blackbody, so that 100% of its power output falls within the microwave band.

Will this device warm the planet more than if it did not exist at all? Or would the visible light converted into electricity by the solar panel equally and exactly offset the energy contribution to the atmosphere from the microwaves, thus keeping total energy (and thus temperature) constant?

wouldn’t make any difference.
most of the microwave energy would be lost in space.
reflected light is also lost.

there was a pretty good weather channel special that pointed out that 95% of solar heating is absorbed by the oceans.
that’s why it’s not generally visible outside your front door.
it’s also why solutions that address the ocean are far more important.

I am looking for options to power a light and vaccum and a cd player in a cabin in the woods. I wouldn’t mind a generator but I dont know how I can save that energy. What would be the best option? Any affordable solar options for me, that would store power?

generator would most likely be best if you are not there all the time. the solar power is an expensive start up, and basically runs on batteries. you can also consider wind power, and if there is a stream near by, hydro.
If you use the batteries to light the house at night, you can also use the generator to recharge those batteries, so you are not running the noisy generator at night.

Hello Everyone,
I am interested in making a HHO generator that is powered by a solar panel that produces 12v but only 2 watts. Is this enough to produce a good amount of hydrogen and oxygen?
13gentj,

To run your car on hydrogen and oxygen you would need more energy than your car produces in the first place. This is because of the inefficiency of the engine and the inefficiency of producing these elements from water through electrolysis.

So you are right to think of adding energy. A solar cell is a clean way to do this. But you have to be realistic in your goals. This set up is not going to produce very much gas but it would be possible to figure out exactly how much and what this will do for you. At 12v your output of 2w means the system is producing about .167amps, not very much.

An additional problem would be to keep the solar panel oriented properly if you intend to use this set up in a moving vehicle. Most solar photovoltaic panels you can buy are only 8 to 20% efficient. When the sun is striking the panel at an angle this can drop off significantly.

Just need to get your opinion if it’s worth the hassle setting a solar power generator at home? How do you compute how much money you can save? How do you determine if it’s viable? Your detailed and meaningful answers will be very much appreciated.
Thanks

Solar hot water almost always pays back in about 4 years, if displacing electric hot water, if you live in a warm climate.

For solar electric, whether you will really save money varies widely by area.

The usual computation is to take the cost of the solar electric system (including panels, mounts, inverter, labor, tax, and fees – but minus tax breaks and incentives) and assume that the cost will be spread over 25 years. So if your system ends up costing you $25,000 net, that would be $1000 per year. You would compare that with your electric bills for a year, and see if it’s cheaper.

I’ve left some things out, such as the cost of money over time, the possible rising price of electricity relative to inflation, and the maintenance cost of replacing the inverter once during the system’s lifetime, but the above is the general idea.

The best way to get an idea is to call several professional installers for free quotes. They will generally run the analysis, and inform you as to how much you could save. You can compare their answers with each other, and with common sense, and judge for yourself. Don’t rush into anything.

For example, if I wanted to see how much waste energy from a house can be turned into usable electricity with a thermoelectric generator, how would I do that?

Or any more ideas?
And how would I word that into a question? "How much electricity can a thermoelectric generator power from waste heat from a house?" or something? PLEASE ASAP

The first question would be "How does the temperature of a thermoelectric device effect the electrical output?" You can measure the temperature fairly easily while measuring the intensity of sunlight is more difficult.
The most likely question about waste heat would be one of these two: "Can electricity be produced from the low level of waste heat from a house heating system?" "Is it cost effective to install thermoelectric generators in the heating system of a house?"

Is there a store I can see and buy solar power products like lights and generators.

Lowes and Walmart both offer solar powered lights.

Is it feasible to use these methods to increase gas mileage? For instance, wind power generators placed strategically in or on the vehicle could at least produce enough electricity to power the radio and other devices. Just a thought.

Explanation:

Not possible.

Most of these do not produce enough lto sustain power (long term power) to move a vehicle (normally weighs about 1 ton).

Also problem on efficiency and mounting of equipment which will make the car even heavier.

You might want to ask yourself this questionon whether you want to drive at 25 mph to your destination. And instead of taking 30 mins now it takes 2 hours.