Solar Panel Rendering

As a plumbing designer and installer, I have been struggling to convey to the customer what their project will look like in the after the installation. For some reason or another, photos of existing installations just don’t do the trick. Another hurdle that I have recently overcome was designing the solar arrays on a building that doesn’t even exist yet. The structural team needed a layout of the arrays on the roof to properly design the structural reinforcement needed to accommodate the new weight of the panels and added snow loads. Ordinarily to calculate the number of solar panels and location you need to first determine the amount of solar shading that you will receive in a given location. The Solar Pathfinder has been the tool of choice in the solar industry for years, but you need the physical site to utilize the tool. I currently use AutoCAD MEP 2010 for all my piping plans for coordination and submittal of construction documents. The software comes with a multitude of tools to help visualize the end product of your system. This gave me the inspiration to use this to consider the physical and esthetic attributes that the panels can have to a building’s architecture. With a picture you are only limited to a display from one point of view. Being able to model the objects in 3D, apply geographical information to the model, along with a date and to jazz it up little some materials you are able to render a very realistic picture of what the project will look like. When the customer decides that they want to see what it would look like from a different point of view or you decide there is not enough sunlight in your location you can move objects around or create and create a different view or create a video.






Proposed Solar Array Layout for UW Milwaukee's New Dorms

This would be the sun at 11:00 on 4-24-09.

"It Aint Easy Being Green?"

With the new construction industry focusing on energy savings more than ever, as plumbers we are becoming forced into keeping up with the latest trends in energy conservation. When being energy efficient was a perk to a project it meerly became a matter of price. Most of the time it was more expensive to build houses with higher efficiency ratings than conventional building practices would achieve. Solar thermal energy has really taken off in the plumbing industry to compliment the growth in energy efficient buildings. Integrating solar domestic water heat with a primary water heating system has never been so advantageous. In most cases the cost of the installation is offset drastically through rebates offered through local utilities and federal tax incentives. When taking into consideration the incentive programs, tax incentives, inflation and the increase in energy costs a solar water heating system typically pays for itself in energy saved in 10-15 years. The typical life expectancy of a system is approx 30 years and in our climate we can expect to offset approx. 50% of our combined annual water heating costs.

I believe now more than ever is the time to consider implementing a solar water heating system into your new or existing house. Nobody is certain but eventually I believe that the utility companies and incentive companies are going to start running dry on their funds. In addition to a lack of funds it may no longer be a option for long not to integrate solar energy into your house.