These days everyone wants to help make a difference in conserving energy, saving money, and helping our planet get "greener". But do you really know what some of the Green Energy options are? And if so, do you know how well they fit into our area?

The following article contains useful explanations of the Green Energy terms and comes to you courtesy of the US Department of Energy. It fits into the "Local Hero" category because when we actively try to conserve and maintain the health of the world we live in we ARE heroes.

What is Green Energy?

You’ve probably all heard this term by now, but do you really know what it means?

Here’s a crash-course in the new terminology of energy efficiency catch phrases. Many of these we can use in our area, and some we can not use. But there are ways in which we can all work toward contributing to a greener planet through energy awareness.

Green Energy is sometimes called “Renewable Energy”. This is energy that uses natural resources such as sunlight, wind, tides and geothermal heat. These types of energy sources are naturally replenished.

Passive Solar
Step outside on a hot and sunny summer day, and you’ll feel the power of solar heat and light. Today, many buildings are designed to take advantage of this natural resource through the use of passive solar heating and daylighting. The south side of a building always receives the most sunlight. Therefore, buildings designed for passive solar heating usually have large, south-facing windows. Materials that absorb and store the sun’s heat can be built into the sunlit floors and walls. The floors and walls will then heat up during the day and slowly release heat at night, when the heat is needed most. This passive solar design feature is called direct gain.

Is this source right for our area? Yes
More Information: Speak to your contractor or building supplier.

Heat from the Sun - Photovoltaic
Solar cells, also called photovoltaics (PV) by solar cell scientists, convert sunlight directly into electricity. Solar cells are often used to power calculators and watches. They are made of semiconducting materials similar to those used in computer chips. When sunlight is absorbed by these materials, the solar energy knocks electrons loose from their atoms, allowing the electrons to flow through the material to produce electricity. This process of converting light (photons) to electricity (voltage) is called the photovoltaic (PV) effect.
Only sunlight of certain energies will work efficiently to create electricity, and much of it is reflected or absorbed by the material that make up the cell. Because of this, a typical commercial solar cell has an efficiency of 15%—about one-sixth of the sunlight striking the cell generates electricity.

Is this source right for our area:

Would it work? Yes.
Would it work well in our area? Probably not.
The weather we have produces a number of cloudy days and if a home or business depended on that as the primary energy source it would not be a steady, reliable source.

More Information: www.EERE.Energy.Gov

Wind Power - Wind Turbines
The power of wind has been harnessed for hundreds of years. From old Holland to farms in the United States wind mills have been used to produce mechanical power for milling grain and pumping water.oday, the windmill’s modern equivalent—a wind turbine—can use the wind’s energy to generate electricity. The electricity is then exported either to the grid for use locally or to power a stand alone application. This renewable source of energy has great potential in both onshore and offshore wind farms. Wind power is one of the cleanest and safest of all the renewable commercial methods of generating electricity.

Is this source right for our area? Probably not due to the fact that in Alabama we do not have the constant wind that is necessary to produce and provide reliable wind-powered energy.

More Information: www.EERE.Energy.Gov