Solartronics, Inc.

Facebook put some effort into these new business profiles......

Great article on solar and battery storage https://www.seia.org/initiatives/solar-plus-storage

Another 18,000 watt PV system installed in Pacific Palisades. (60) LG Electronics 300 watt panels (1) SMA SB10000TLUS inverter (1) SMA SB3000TLUS inverter (12) Enphase 250 micro-inverters

Gotta love it, solar prices falling while installations increase. http://www.solarbuildermag.com//solar-costs-continue-to-/

CalSEIA has a new Executive Director, Bernadette Del Chiaro. With over a decade of experience in renewable legislation at the highest level.

Completion of the Malibu project. 100 LG260 watt panels with (4)SMA inverters on a new standing seam metal roof plus upgrade the existing 200 amp main elec. panel to a 400 amp service.

Our latest project in Malibu, single family residence. New metal roof, upgrade the main electric service to 400 Amps, and install a new 25KW solar electric system using LG 260 watt solar modules, three SMA SB6000 + one SMA S3000 inverters, and four Enphase 215 microinverters.

So what about as the Earth warms, the hurricanes that are typically closer to the equator now move away (since it is warmer than it was). The jet stream has always been there, and so have the Nor-Easters, but add the hurricane component, and you have a whole new game....a super storm. More to come, hang on world. Oh, and what if carbon in the atmosphere does make a difference? Don't drill baby, don't drill. Alternative energy, it is available.

When will we learn. Dallas Tx. had never had an earthquake, ever, until they started fracking. http://news.yahoo.com/unusual-dallas-earthquakes-linked-fra

Most of the drop is due to lower natural gas prices, which comes at the cost of fracking......yikes. Out of the frying pan and into the fire. http://news.yahoo.com/ap-impact-co2-emissions-us-drop-20-lo

Solar Joe (my son), on a commercial solar electric site evaluation in downtown LA. He's a good son and my partner.

We all know what a solar panel looks like, but how does a solar panel make electricity? The traditional method of making electricity is by using water pressure or steam pressure to turn a turbine which creates electricity. But a solar panel just sits there in the sun and has no moving parts, so how does a solar panel make electricity? When you look closely at a solar panel you will see it is made up of a metal frame that hold a piece of tempered glass. Behind the glass are... many blue colored square cells, all lined up in rows. If you look really closely, you will see that there is another layer behind the cells called a back-sheet. You can see portions of the back-sheet between each cell. The back-sheet acts as a reflector to bounce any light that may get through the cell, back toward the cell. But how does the solar panel actually make electricity? The blue cells on the panel are made of high grade silicon, similar to the silicon that is used in semi-conductors. The back of each cell is coated with a special chemical that makes the silicon reactive to light particles. We call this property photovoltaic. Light from the sun contains particles called photons, and when the photons strike the silicon cells, an electron is released. We all know that electricity is made up of electrons that flow through a wire. So as millions of electrons are released across the entire solar panel, electricity is made. Now if you look closely, again, at the solar panel, you will see little, tiny, thin wires that run parallel to each other from one end of the panel to the other. As the electrons are released, they find their way to the thin wires and they all line up and follow the wires to a small junction box that is located on the back of the panel. Out of the junction box comes two larger wires, one is positive, and one is negative. These wires are hooked up, solar panel to solar panel, to multiply the amount of electricity made. The more panels, the more electricity. Simple, eh? But it’s not over, because this electricity made by solar panels is in the form of DC or direct current, and our homes use AC or alternating current. This will be the topic for another blog.

Just got back from teaching a UCLA Solar PV1 field lab at two of our installations, one a string inverter, the other micro-inverters.