Solar Power House
A solar power house is any home that is built, designed or modified to make use of solar power.
Most people think of solar power as being solar electricity, from photo voltiac (PV) panels on the roof or
someplace facing the sun. But solar power can be heat or light in any form.
Solar power can be the heat that warms a thick stone wall in your house during the day, so the warmed-up wall
radiates the heat back at you during the night, to help keep the home warm. That thick stone, brick, mud-brick,
pise or concrete wall provides heat mass; and so do containers of water, such as water tanks or 50 gallon
(200 liter) drums.
Solar power can be sunlight heating some water panels on the roof which then fill a storage tank with hot water
for showering or taking a bath.
Or solar power can be used to heat warm air, as in a gadget called a trompe window. this traps the air where it
can be heated, and then directs the warm air either back into the house for heating purposes... Or else a trompe
window can be used to expel hot air out of a room - which then can be used to suck cooler air into that room. That
is a form of passive air conditioning.
Cool air can be provided by a specially-dug tunnel outside the home. The entrance to this tunnel, where the
cooler air is sucked in from, can be shaded and surrounded by plants. This will add moisture to the cooled air and
make it more pleasant to live with. This concept is illustrated in PERMACULTURE A Designers' Manual by
Bill Mollison, published by Tagari Books.
A great example of a solar power house is a type of home called an EarthShip. These partly buried structures
have thick earth banks on three sides, and a windows on the fourth side which faces the sunlight. (In the nothern
hemisphere, such as in the USA and Europe, an earthship faces south. But in the southern hemisphere, Australia, New Zealand, parts of Africa
and South America, an earthship or solar powered house will face north.)
See also Solar Powered Home.
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