What Are the Advantages of Solar Energy Use?
One advantage that
comes with use of solar energy and/or solar
energy systems is that a homeowner (or even
an entire community) can afford to have proper
lighting of the house and neighborhood for
security reasons after dusk. This has many
benefits, like reducing incidents of crime
because security personnel of a building or
community can see what is happening even at
a distance with better clarity; preventing
accidents (such as may occur between vehicles
in a dimly-lighted street); and permit more
activities to be conducted at night (like
evening tennis matches at community centers.)
Without solar power, costs go up with use
of nighttime lighting so expenses may become
prohibitive for the homeowner or community.
When people pool together resources to purchase
a fairly-extensive solar energy system, this
results in cost-efficiencies for the group
and less cost to be shouldered by each individual
(as compared to one homeowner having to invest
in his own home solar energy systems which
can reach up to $200,000 in total initial
investment.) This is why some communities
have invested in centralized village solar-energy
power plants that can function either as a
battery recharging facility (allowing individual
community members to recharge their respective
batteries) or as a local wired network (which
is basically a power grid that supplies power
to the houses connected to the grid constantly.)
A centralized village solar-energy power plant
would be a good idea especially if the community
needs to set up health care facilities that
have internal refrigeration facilities to
prevent medicine from expiring too fast.
If you (the homeowner) prefer to invest in
your own individualistic solar energy system,
that is also possible but you have to be prepared
to shoulder all the costs that go with owning
something by yourself – like the cost
of replacing parts (since even solar energy
systems break down and wear out); the cost
of having the system repaired; and the daily
toil of having to monitor the performance
of your home solar energy systems. These are
potential disadvantages that are part and
parcel of being independent, yet being independent
of the group has its perks in that you are
autonomous of any decisions that group may
choose to make, and you have control over
your own system. If you are the type who dislikes
having others meddle with your stuff, then
you should invest in your own home solar energy
systems instead to avoid problems with others.
Sometimes this is the most prudent (though
rather expensive) decision to make, to prevent
problems from developing later on.
One great aspect about relying on solar energy
systems is that they are certainly more sustainable
to use than dependence on other energy sources.
For one thing, you will probably not encounter
problems getting a supply of sunlight (unless
you live in certain parts of the world where
sunlight disappears for months at a time.)
In many countries, you can count on sunlight
appearing for at least some hours anyway –
if you can bank on a significant amount of
direct sunlight being collected by your solar
energy systems, which should be good enough
for your electricity needs for the day. If
sunlight is supplied steadily throughout the
day, that would be even better. (In the world
of energy production, lack of adequate supply
is one of the biggest factors that would drive
up costs – as proven by the rise and
fall of the price of oil and gas in the world
market.) |
