DIY solar heating

Energy generated from the sun is solar energy and it can be collected and conserved for later use. Solar energy is one of the cheapest forms of energy that saves you from paying monstrous electric bills. Solar energy is used for heating, building and in homes during winter and also for heating water.

DIY Passive solar heating

The DIY solar heating is today used in most of the homes as it helps in heating the homes during winter effectively and efficiently. The passive solar energy systems do not have pumps and circulation methods for heat and energy transfers. The most important part of the passive solar component is the south facing side of the structure. The structures that shade the southern surface of the house has to be cleared else it will be a waste of solar energy. The DIY heating with passive solar heating, focuses on windows that face the south side of the home. Make sure that there are large windows to take full advantage of the power of the sun and also to add materials to the flooring below the windows that absorb heat and then radiate it after the sunset. This type of DIY passive solar heating is known as "direct gain". The demerit of this heating is that though the strategy is simple the heat loss is high. This is because the windows create heat during day and are insulators at night. To make this type of heating effective sunspaces and trombe walls need to be added to the south side of the house.

Sunspaces

Sunspace is like a greenhouse and is built on the southern side of the solar structure. The sunspace is heated when the sunlight passes through glass or other glazing materials. Proper ventilation helps the heat to circulate into the building.

Trombe wall

Trombe wall is one of the techniques that are used in passive solar heating for thermal storage and delivery. Trombe is named after Felix Trombe. Trombe wall is an eight to 16 inch thick masonry wall coated with a dark heat-absorbing material and faced with a single or double layer of glass. The glass placed in the wall creates a small airspace. The heat from the sun that passes through the glass is absorbed by the dark surface and stored in the wall and slowly transferred inward through the masonry. Applying a selective surface to trombe wall improves its performance by reducing the amount of infrared energy radiated back through the glass. The selective surface is a sheet of metal foil that is pasted on the outside surface of the wall. This metal absorbs the radiation in the visible portion of the solar spectrum and emits very little infrared rays. Rooms heated by trombe wall are more comfortable than those heated by forced-air furnaces.

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