Solar Heating Tubes: The Other Green Energy

April 5, 2010
By Craig Axelrod

In today's business and political climate, all savvy building owners are looking for ways to comply with government and tenant demands that we find more environmentally conscious ways of supplying energy to our buildings. We're all familiar with wind technology, and the great advances that are being made in that field, but allow me to introduce you to solar heating tubes: the other green energy source. There is no better, or more untapped, source of renewable energy than the sun. Every day, 365 days per year in most environs, the sun gives us several hours of ambient heat. Yet most of the energy it supplies goes unused, while instead we use carbon fuels, which are rapidly being depleted, and only becoming more and more expensive. The situation is only going to get worse for those who continue to rely on fossil fuels, and the time to embrace an environmentally favorable approach to supplying our energy needs is now, while the governments of many states and countries are willing to help subsidize the costs.

Employing solar heating tubes, the other green energy, has many benefits, both to landlords and tenants. Depending on the amount of hot water is used in the building, the savings can be huge, even if solar power is used only to heat the building's water. Of course, buildings with differing purposes use vastly different quantities of hot water, but hot water is used in one fashion or another in virtually every building, whether it is for tenants taking showers, doing laundry, washing dishes, or any of a number of other uses. Many buildings also employ radiant heat, using coils of heated water beneath the floors to heat the entire building. If this is the case with your buildings, you will be able to take even greater advantage of the energy cost savings by cutting deep into your oil, gas, and electrical use for heating your buildings.

Solar heating tubes employ the latest green technology to make optimal use of the sun's rays. The cylindrical shape of the receptors allows the receiving unit to harvest solar energy during all daylight hours, simply because the sun's rays will be striking the surface of the cylinder during all daylight hours, as opposed to a flat solar panel, which only receives optimal solar power when the sun is shining directly on its flat surface. Coupled with the fact that the energy is then stored in copper rods inside of a vacuum sealed tube, which allows very little of the energy to escape. So little, in fact, that the outsides of the tubes can be cool to the touch while the temperature of the rods storing the solar power can be well over 300 degrees Fahrenheit. The combination of these two recent advances in solar technology allows building owners to utilize solar power even in climates where it was once though to be impractical, such as those with much cloudy weather and colder environments.

This is one green technology that you are going to want to be on the cutting edge of. Employing the other green technology, the solar heating tube, will not only reduce your carbon footprint and help save the planet, but it also has the potential to leave a lot of extra green in your bank account. When you put those two things together, it's awfully hard to come up with a good reason not to use solar heating tubes.