Solar PV panels produce your electricity using something called a photoelectric effect. The photoelectric effect was first noticed in 1839 by a French physicist named Edmund Beckerel. It has been found that some materials will generate a small electric current when exposed to light. This is the principle used in Solar Panel. The first practical applications of solar panels were boarding a spacecraft in the 1960s. Over time, technology improved and panels became smaller and cheaper. Nowadays, solar panels are quite cheap and effective for home use.
What is a solar cell?
Solar panels are small devices that can convert sunlight into electricity. The cell alone will provide only a very small amount of energy. Many cells are connected to each other and attached to the frame of the solar panel (or block), which can generate maximum and useful energy. When several panels are connected together, you have a solar system.
How do solar panels work?
Simply put, a solar cell works like this: inside a solar cell, you have two layers of thin silicon wafer stacked on top of each other to form a type of silicon sandwich. The top layer is specially treated so that its atoms are unstable - they have one of the many electrons from which they are actually released. The bottom layer is also processed, but this time the atoms have some voids that can actually be done with an electron to fill them. So the upper layer desperately loses some electrons, the lower layer desperately loses some electrons, and the electrons themselves want to move down from the upper layer. This setting uses everything to generate electricity. There is only one problem: electrons cannot move freely inside a silicon crystal - unless the Solar Panel is exposed to light.
When sunlight reaches the top layer of silicon, it "excites" the electrons and gives them enough energy to move. Electrons begin to flow from the top layer to the bottom. And as we know, when a group of electrons starts moving in the same direction, we have electricity. Insert two metal contacts on each side of the silicon sandwich and we have electricity running through the circle.
There is one last piece of dough before using electricity. The electricity produced by solar PV cells is direct current. The electricity used in your home is alternating current (alternating current). Therefore, the current coming from the solar panel system must go through the inverter, pump it into the home and use power supplies before converting from DC to AC.
(This is a simplified version of how it works with non-technical species. You can read a more detailed scientific explanation here).
Do Solar Panels Work in the UK?
Solar panels use clean energy from an almost infinite source. Great agar - if you live in Australia. But is there enough sunlight in the UK to be worth investing in Solar Panel system? The short answer is yes. The good news is that despite our unforeseen weather conditions, the sun does not have to be outside for the solar panels to work. As you might expect, on a sunny day they will produce more energy, but on a cloudy day they will still produce some energy - the more light, the higher their output. And remember that solar panels use light instead of heat to generate electricity.