Solar and Wind Power and Alternative Energy Information

Renewable Energy

Renewable Energy is energy taken from natural resources that is naturally replenished.

Examples of renewable energy are: sun power, wind power, wave power, geothermal power and all the different ways of utilising the rain, wind, tides and sunlight to generate and store energy. Also included is the use of biomass, utilising dead or recently dead organic material for instance wood-burning.

Most renewable energy technologies use the power of the sun as a starting point. The sun warms the oceans of the earth, and creates ocean currents and waves, climate exists because of the heat of the sun and we have wind and rain as a result which can both be exploited for renewable energy projects.

The IEA Renewable Energy Working Party in 2002 defined renewable energy as: "Renewable energy is derived from natural processes that are replenished constantly. In its various forms, it derives directly from the sun, or from heat generated deep within the earth. Included in the definition is electricity and heat generated from solar, wind, ocean, hydropower, biomass, geothermal resources, and biofuels and hydrogen derived from renewable resources."

Examples of Renewable Energy

• Wind Energy: Wind farms producing electricity that is fed into a national grid, Wind Turbines for personal use, sails to power boats and, of course, windmills.
  
  
• Photovoltaics: Solar Panels, Converting sunlight directly into electricity, solar cells, photovoltaic arrays, Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) - where the solar panels are built into the walls of buildings.
  
  
• Solar thermal technologies: Solar radiators, solar ovens, solar chimneys, solar-thermal panels, solar air-conditioning, heat banks, solar materials, solar engineering, buildings utilising heat of sun in their design or building materials.
  
  
• Solar thermal electric technologies: Heat Engines, Heating and hot water for industrial, residential and commercial uses. By concentrating heat from the sun to produce steam and / or electricity. Solar fans, solar Pumps, Photovoltaics.
  
  
• Biomass resources: Biofuel, biogas, agrofuels, wood, grasses, sorghum, sunflower oil, crops and crop residues, coconut oil, rapeseed oil. Biofuels are widely used to power vehicles, heat homes and cook food. Biogas is created from the organic breakdown of waste organic material such as sewage.
  
  
• Geothermal technology: Heat from the earth to provide space heating, hot water and power generation. The Phillipines and Iceland produce a significant amount of their total energy requirements from geothermal energy. A huge advantage of geothermal power is that it requires no fuel and therefore is virtually emissions free and almost totally carbon neutral.
  
  
• Hydropower: Hydro-electric power stations, hydro-electric generators, irrigation, hydro-sawmills, hydro-cranes, hydro-lifts, all of which utilise the power of water to produce mechanical energy.
  
  
• Oceans: Tidal Forces, Ocean Currents, Wave Power and Thermal Gradients.
  
  
• Hydrogen: Storage medium and carrier of energy produced from other renewable energy resources.
  
  

Renewable Energy

Renewable Energy on the web.

Fusel How to run your diesel engine on sunflower oil. This site give practical advice on the viability of converting your diesel engined vehicle to run on WVO (Waste Vegetable Oil) or SVO (Straight Vegetable Oil). Conversion Kits, Sources of Straight and Waste Oil and Examples of Engine Conversions are all covered.