Are you curious to know how solar panels work? First of all, you should know that there are two main types of solar panels, the solar electric panels and solar water heating panels.
PV Panels
How solar panels work depends on the type of solar panel and in this particular one, we’re talking about PV panels. What does PV stands for? P is for Photo which refers to light and V for voltaic electricity. PV systems convert sunlight directly into electricity and a PV cell is made of a semiconductor material which absorbs the sunlight. There are more complex PV systems that produce solarf electricity for houses and the utility grid. This utility grid is the power source available to your local electricity provider. PV cells are combined into modules or panels that contains 40 cells.
PV panels contain a top protective layer, two specially treated layers of silicon with collecting circuitry attached to the top layer and a polymer backing layer. The top layer of silicon is treated to make it electrically negative while the back layer is treated to make it electrically positive. When sunlight hits electrons loose from the silicon, they will move up from the bottom layer of the silicon and crowd the electrons in the top layer. The freed electrons from the top layer are collected by electrical contacts on the surface of the top layer and routed through ane external circuit, thus providing power to the electrical system attached to the panels.
How solar panels work can be a complicated subject matter especially to those who are not into science. However, if you plan to switch to solar energy, it is very important that you familiarize yourself with it and how it works. PV panels are the common solar panels that are used for solar energy.
A lot of people question what happens at night and on cloudy days, since solar electric systems only produce power when the sun is shining, there are many consumers that connect their solar system to a utility power grid that will provide additional electricity when the solar panels are not producing enough. It is called a grid-tied system.