There are two important factors that govern solar power cost and they are quite simply, the assembly cost of the solar power panels and the installation cost of the solar system in the home.
Solar panels may well be efficient, eco-friendly and also help to save our planet but until they can be competitive in the energy market place they will never be widely used. A new coal-burning plant can deliver electrical power at $2 per watt and making this the benchmark figure that the solar experts want to match.
For the past 20 years scientists have been developing ingenious and cheaper designs of solar panels. It is the Silicone based photovoltaic panels which have dominated the industry and they sell for about $3 a watt, however this is before installation.
For some time there was an actual scarcity of silicone and although the interest in solar panels was increasing, the solar panel producers were not able to fulfill that demand. Now even though there is an ample supply of silicone, nevertheless the operation of refining it to make the semiconductors is a costly process and there are not many facilities that do this. The few factories that can manufacture this refined silicone have a monopoly on the supply meaning that even though the demand is high they still keep the price inflated.
The price of refined silicone is one of the key factors in the cost of solar panels. The main thrust of research going on today is in improving ways to reduce the quantity of silicone that is needed to produce a solar panel. There is also investigation taking place in using alternative less expensive materials that are equally efficient. There are specific organic materials that have semiconductor properties which may be used rather than silicone.
The expense of installation will change quite dramatically depending on whether you do it by yourself or if you call in a professional installer. To install a solar powered system in your own home using a specialist installer will cost you between $10 - $12 per watt. If you install the solar system by yourself then it should probably cost you about $4 per watt.
Whilst the initial cost of installation of a home solar power system would still be relatively expensive it is inevitable that in the near future, given the astounding advancements that are happening, the cost should come down. In the mean time, governments around the world are encouraging and subsidizing the use of this particular technology by giving tax rebates and credits for home owners who install solar energy systems.
So if you set up your solar power system yourself at the cost of approximately $4 per watt and then claim all the tax savings and credits that are offered in your area, then your solar power cost may not be so far from the $2 per watt standard of the energy delivered by the coal-burning plant.
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