Living in the tropics has its perks like temperatures that don’t fluctuate too much, lovely fresh fruit available all year round and best of all, sunshine almost every single day! With the amount and duration of sunshine that we receive, it makes perfect sense to choose solar power.
Firstly, solar power is when sunlight is converted into electricity. The way this is done is via photovoltaic cells which uses semi-conductors that absorb the radiation from the sun which then emits electrons and then harnessed as electricity.
Solar power is a form of renewable energy that makes it more sustainable than the usual ways of generating electricity such as nuclear energy and coal burning. Conventional methods of generating electricity produce copious amounts of greenhouse gases which is a main cause of global warming.
Renewable sources of energy can be replenished and used infinitely. These include wind, tidal, geothermal, hydroelectric power, and solar sources.
Advantages of solar power
Popular methods of utilising solar power include water heaters and also, natural lighting during the day with skylights in homes.
Solar panels require very little maintenance because after installation, they’re good to go and don’t require any mechanical parts that have a chance of failing. Additionally, it’s a silent way of producing energy which is great especially if your neighbours don’t like a lot of noise.
Producing solar power in your home can help you out in more ways than one. Excess electricity generated via your solar panels could lead to passive income by selling the electricity back to the government. Check out the Sustainable Energy Development Authority Malaysia website at seda.gov.my under Feed-in-Tariff (FiT) for more information on how to do this.
Solar power generated electricity is also better for our environment because it contributes 96 to 98 percent less greenhouse gases compared to electricity generated with coal, according to the Energy Research Centre of the Netherlands.
Solar power is also a great source of electricity especially for rural communities located too far away to connect to a power grid. An example of this is the Solar Home System under Sarawak Energy’s corporate social responsibility initiative. This has benefitted villages in Batang Ai and its neighbouring communities that are too far away to connect to the Batang Ai Hydropower Station grid. This also has reduced the dependency on diesel powered generators which are costly to keep up and also contribute to greenhouse gas emissions.
Drawbacks of solar power
Due to solar power being very weather dependent, if there’s a streak of cloudy days, it’s possible to not be able to generate any electricity during that time. Additionally, solar power can’t be made during the night either.
Low conversion efficiency is another problem that might hinder solar power generation because not all the radiation from the sun absorbed by the panels can be made into electricity.
Can be expensive to install in the beginning depending on the vendor. Its battery to store the generated electricity isn’t cheap either.
References: Borneo Post; GreenMatch (UK); The New York Times; University of Minnesota (US);
