Renewable Energy and its many forms

Driving around this area it will be obvious to the observer that many of the rooftops now sport Solar Panels.

Although we do not get much sun here, the solar panels still produce energy to heat and light our homes. Those who have invested in them know that energy they use during daylight hours is created by the solar panels, and that there is a government incentive which allows solar energy units to be sold to the National Grid and so electricity bills are reduced, and you are paid for the energy you produce.



  Now Dumfries & Galloway Housing Partenrship (DGHP) has gone a step further than solar energy. It has invited its tenants to choose which type of energy they want. The choice being :- Air source, solar and ground source (geothermal).



Air Source heating



Some have gone for air source which entails having a box with a fan fitted to the outside of your house which draws in air and acts like a refrigerator in reverse by delivering heated air to the house.


 



 

Others have chosen geothermal ground source energy. This is obtained by drilling 100 meters down into the earth, placing a pipe filled with antifreeze into the hole, which gathers the heat from the earth and pumps it back up the pipe into the house to power heating and lighting.

Drilling down 100 meters

An explanation of how geothermal energy works.



Geothermal pipes and solar panels

In fact some of the tenants have even got a mix of solar panels and geothermal heating.

Those who have adopted these forms of energy will no longer be at the mercy of continual price rises from the gas oil and electricity companies! How GOOD is that!!!!!