Cool your Solar panels
 

I like the ease of construction and low investment dollar of this PV panel cooling idea, 10% gains in power production can be incurred by cooling off those sun baking panels.
If one was so inclined he could recycle or use the run off hot water.

I suspect you could build this cooler for about $100 and gain 10% in your arrays summer hot days output.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APJZST-PB-Q


below he has improved on the drooping water lines

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XW5cUVfLlIk

The second video is here:

Solar PV Panel Cooler Reworked Sprays - YouTube

thanks for the catch jeff , i got them both linked now..

I was thinking a pump hooked up to a timer would cut costs on this project and be easier to build.

Soft water is the only way to go if using this type of method to cool the panels. Otherwise there will be a nasty,scaly film on the glass.

Good point lamgeo you got me thinking , rain water would be best to use as its mineral free and free to collect, if you do not live in a desert.

Attachment 4217

Or live in a county or city that has made it illegal to collect rainwater.

I would personally leave the country if i was imprisoned so much by my government that collecting rain water was deemed illegal, whats next no walking !

Walking surely causes big business to lose money lol

How can they stop me from collecting rainwater? I mean, who's riding around on patrol for that? Unless I have a hostile neighbor or someone has a grudge against me, I believe I could get away with it.

I'll have to ask my friends who live in Colorado how that works.

I'm from South Florida and in the old days everything that fell from the sky was diverted to run off into drainage canals and out to the ocean. In modern times, the thinking has reversed 180°, and all run-off should be maintained on-site. It's a good thing loose sand is the predominate soil type in my yard.

The fun part of this project is finding a small low voltage pump capable of moving water 1-2 stories high with enough volume to supply the emitters/spray heads.