What would you say if I could sell you ‘solar’ panels that worked during the night and can be placed on vertical walls and north facing roofs. They could provide 100% of your hot water needs – night and day – all year round. They could meet 100% of your heating needs throughout the heating season – and heat your pool all summer. They work with underfloor heating or traditional radiators. You’d have some – right? You’d do the Apple thing and all form a not-so-orderly queue to be first to grab one – right? Or would you question my sanity and assume I’d just got back from the pub on pull-the-other-one night?
A lot of very powerful and frankly almost unbelievable claims are being made for this relatively new technology, that I can only describe as a strange cross between solar thermal and air source heat pumps. They are THERMODYNAMIC SOLAR systems. Please tell me that one of you has actually installed one of these systems or at least seen one working.
A few websites to whet your appetite:
http://www.solarandgreen.co.uk/menu/thermodynamic-water-heating_29
http://www.energie.pt/fotos/documentos/brochura_a4_uk_1321543193.pdf
http://thermasol.ie/thermodynamic-solar-panels.html
http://freegreenenergyuk.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=73&Itemid=100
http://www.greenheat-renewables.co.uk/thermodynamic-solar.php
Colin Anderson
