A new and innovative social housing building covered with solar panels recently popped up in Paris near the Barbes metro station. Designed by French team Philippon-Kalt Architects, the project features a grid-like glass façade that has been fitted with energy-generating solar panels. Located in the 19th Arrondissement, the building is the first of its kind in the public housing sector.
Earlier this year I wrote about Glasspoint Energy and its innovative method of using solar power to heat water to make steam, which gets injected into old oil fields to coax out stubborn heavy oil. Glasspoint installs its cheap, flimsy aluminum foil-like solar collectors inside simple glass houses (think agricultural greenhouses), which shelter the gear from the elements. Materials costs are a fraction of those for more traditional solar collectors. Glasspoint’s first commercial project was for Berry Petroleum in the century-old oil fields near Bakersfield, Calif.
If you live in the Midwest, and if you are a solar energy aficionado, you have had great reason to be jealous of most, if not all, of the rest of the country. The great states of Florida, California, Arizona, Texas, Oregon, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and North Carolina have all received headlines of leading-edge technology, especially in the commercial solar hot water space.
In this unobtrusive mid-country, which is frozen stiff for at least six months of the year, a new model and implementation of commercial solar hot water has been successfully completed. In downtown St. Paul, Minn., there is a new solar hot water heating plant that is now producing a large share of the heating for the city’s Saint Paul RiverCentre convention center. The RiverCentre offers 162,000-plus square feet of convention and ballroom space, and is connected to the Xcel Energy Center, situated on a six-acre adjoining site encompassing another 650,000 square feet of open territory.
Solar power actually dates back over 2,500 years ago. While nowhere as complex as systems today, the Romans used the sun as a natural heat source to the point where they had to enact laws regarding sun rights.
Commercially, solar power made its debut in the late 1800’s. After black boxes started dotting the rooftops of Baltimore, Charles Kemp patented the first solar water heating system. The original systems were basic: the back boxes held water that were heated throughout the day. Kemp combined this style with the scientific principle of a hot box and the Climax was born.
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