Solar Shingles: An Alternative to Solar Panels

For the past decade the popularity and efficiency of solar energy has been growing rapidly worldwide. Most people have seen solar panels going up on houses and businesses in their community. This usually takes form as an array of large silver rectangular panels spread out across the roof or other free standing structure such as a parking cover, or sometimes directly into the car itself. Vanity almost always takes second to functionality. A few companies such as SunPower have created all black solar panels but this doesn't change the clunky look of the panels themselves. Fortunately, recent breakthroughs in thin film design have lead to a more integrated approach called solar shingles.

Solar shingles, or photovoltaic shingles, were first released in 2005. Much like the larger solar panels we are used to, solar shingles capture sunlight and transform it into useable energy. Unlike the larger solar panel discussed above, they are typically 12 inches wide and 86 inches long and can be stapled directly to the roofing cloth just like normal shingles. Once installed, they give the roof a purplish blue tint but otherwise look much like regular tar and sand shingles.

Electricity is generated through solar shingles when the sun strikes a semiconductor layer, which is typically made from crystalline silicon, laminated to the shingle's surface. According to an article on Thisoldhouse.com, a single solar shingle produces about 50-200 watts of energy, which is enough energy to power a wall fan. This isn't bad for one tiny shingle but just think how much you could do with a whole roof of them? One of the big challenges with solar panels is determining how many to install, they don't usually come in smaller sizes so many customers end up with too much or just under what they could really use. The smaller dimensions of shingles eliminate this issue.

According to an article on solar shingles on Hubpages.com, solar shingles on your roof can create energy for your household for up to forty years! What's amazing about this is that most people replace the shingles at least once within this kind of time frame so you could actually cut down on the maintenance costs of your house in addition to the boost in sustainability. The biggest payoff with any solar technology is the savings in transporting energy to the location of use. With traditional coal or nuclear energy power is lost as it is transferred along lines all over the city. Micro power or localized solar solves this.

Just like regular solar panels, energy generated from solar shingles is stored either locally in a battery or passed through to the grid using net metering. During the night when users need energy the grid pumps it out but during the day they feed energy in which is shared all over the community, including corporations and businesses where the house owner may work.

Wikipedia states that, "Backup storage, in the form of batteries, is expensive, adds complexity to the installation, and is uneconomic in any large scale. Battery backup units require an array of additional hardware. This includes batteries, battery enclosures, battery charge controllers, and separate sub panels for critical load circuits. However, grid power is only useful as a backup system if it is available when solar power is not." If you live far away from an established grid, don't have access an electric company that offers net metering or are building a completely new sub division however, the battery storage option may begin to make sense.

Are solar shingles expensive? Well, compared to traditional solar panels, the answer is no. One author on Hubpages.com claims that not only will you be reducing your monthly energy bill, you will be increasing the overall value of your house by as much as 4%. With the price of energy and building uncertain going forwards, locking in your rates by tethering the energy of the sun might be a wise decision and reflect this increase in property value. While your neighbors are all suffering through brown outs and outages you may doing just fine.

In addition, Hubpages.com states that installing solar shingles "gives you back a price premium of about 10%, which is an increased value of your property, after making it energy efficient and renewable." So, depending on your situation as a home owner this return could represent a 6% increase in value at day one with ongoing benefits, minus the cost of interest if you take out a loan.

While older models of solar shingles were a bit more expensive because they were a new technology, new models such as shingles made with thin-film copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) cells are far more affordable and can be installed in as little as 10 hours instead of the 22 to 30 hours it takes to install large solar panels.

So who makes solar shingles? Companies that currently manufacture solar shingles include SunPower Corporation, Solar Components Corporation, Atlantis Energy Systems, and Dow Chemical. In addition, large homebuilders in California are partnering with companies like SunPower to offer homes that have solar systems already installed. This is a wonderful thing to see because the costs of rewiring and reinforcing a roof for solar can take up as much as 50% of the overall cost and regularly becomes a deciding factor for families considering renewable energy. Even homes that come "solar ready" but do not have solar panels or shingles installed are worth more than the status quo.