An important consideration for self sufficient living involves hot water. There is really no excuse these days for doing without hot water as there are several ways to get it. While it might be considered a modern comfort, it can be a necessity for the use of hydrotherapy (we’ll have to cover that in a future post). One important method to obtain hot water is by tapping into the energy of the sun.
A simple solar water heating system pumps cold water to a collector and then the heated water flows back to a storage tank. The water pipes in the collector are attached to an absorber plate, painted black to absorb the heat from the sun. As heat builds up in the collector, it raises the temperature of the water passing through the tubes which finally flows to the storage tank. A good system will even heat water on a cloudy day.
The use of hot water solar panels is simple and doesn’t create any pollution. More elaborate systems can even be used to heat a home through the use of radiant heat tubing.
