How To Benefit From The Best Solar Garden And Patio Lights

May 17, 2010 1 Comment

You can buy Solar garden and patio lights just about anywhere that garden supplies are sold. They have a way of making a garden space seem more glamorous and finished. It might be the final stage to your garden project. If you are needing some tips and ways that you can make these lights work for you, then follow some quick guidelines.

Many people start off their garden by putting in some plants and shrubs and designing it in such a way that it looks professional. By adding a patio set it is almost complete. The lights can sometimes be the last thing that you put in, and as it lights up your garden at night, it can be well worth all the fuss.

One of the fantastic aspects to the solar lights is that they require no electricity. That means you don’t have to think about where you are putting them in relation to a plug outlet or where a cord might be seen. They get all of their energy right from the sun and then shine all night.

Placing these lights beside favorite flowers or trees, might be a great location for your solar panel lights. You might even try places such as the rim of your roof, deck, shed, and fence. When your yard is lit up, it can be a beautiful sight at night.

There are lots of reasons why adding some lighting can work for you and your home. It can light up your yard and create a feeling a security. It can also allow you and your family to sit outside and socialize at night, and it can even just make the garden area look great.

When lights have been put up outside, it can create an outdoor space. This can be ideal if you have people over and need more space to move around. You could have the backyard space lit up and decorated for guests to enjoy.

If you are concerned with the environment, then you are doing your part, by using Solar garden and patio lights. They are low maintenance and can make any space look festive and amazing. They are good on the hydro bill and do not even need to be thought about, they turn themselves off during the day. That means you do not have to worry about having them turned off at the end of the night. The only time you need to touch them is if you experience cold and snowy weather in the winter, then you will want to bring them into the garage or shed.

Solar garden lights increase the beauty of your outdoor space. Patio lights expand the choices for outdoor entertaining to the evening hours.

Filed Under Environment Tagged With Environment, home and garden, home improvement, landscape and garden, landscape lighting, lighting, solar lighting

Solar Lights – The Wave of the Future

May 9, 2010 Leave a Comment

When you think of solar lights, what image comes to mind? Most people will picture big, ugly solar panels with wires going to very plain, boring light fixtures that don’t match the home at all. Luckily, this is no longer the case with today’s modern solar lighting technology. The photovoltaic (solar) cells have shrunk in size and grown in efficiency; needing less and less light to produce more energy. The integration of Ni-cad rechargeable batteries into the design of the fixture allows for the storing of more of the energy gathered by the solar cells. The bulbs themselves have evolved from the older incandescent and CFL bulbs to LED bulbs that do a much better job of turning energy into light.

With the advancement of solar technology, solar lighting manufacturers are able to design new styles of and applications for solar lights. The new compact designs of solar path lights makes them so easy to install, that you just have to take them out of the box and put them where you want them. The solar cells and batteries are built right into the light fixture. Solar accent lights come in a variety of elegant designs that will accent your home’ landscape during the day as well as at night. There are even motion sensing solar security lights that are very easy to mount to a wall and will light up when someone enters your front porch or driveway – all without any wiring involved.

The benefits of using solar lighting around your home are many. Fist of all, most solar lights are wireless. That makes them super easy to install just about anywhere where they can gather light. For those places that do not get much light during the day, there are lights that come with a remote panel that you can locate in a sunnier location. In that case, you will have 1 wire to worry about.

Another advantage is that they are 100% maintenance free. Solar lights are truly “set-and-forget” technology. The batteries and bulbs should last as long as the fixture does. In fact if either of them gives out, the fixtures have become so inexpensive that it makes sense to just replace the light fixture. Just mount the light where you want it and let it do what it does without any worries.

To me, the greatest benefit of all is that solar lighting is “green”. They use renewable energy (the sun). That makes them great for the environment and for your pocketbook. The earth is running out of non-renewable resources and the cost of electricity is constantly going up. Not only does switching to solar lighting allow you to help save the planet’s resources, but it saves you money as well. They cost nothing to run.

As you can see, there are many benefits to using solar lighting around your home and garden. As the technology continues to grow, solar lights will become more and more efficient and less and less expensive. Save money and do your part for the environment. Switch to solar lights!

Learn more about solar lights. Head over to Steve Schafer’s site where you can find out all about solar patio lighting and what it can do for you.

Filed Under Environment Tagged With Environment, home and garden, home improvement, landscape and garden, landscape lighting, solar lighting

Understanding The Solar Shed

November 11, 2009 Leave a Comment

So how is a solar shed different to a regular shed? The answer is to be found in the way that a power meeting differs from just any old meeting – the presence or absence of power, and in the case of our shed, specifically solar power.

An obvious problem with garden sheds though is that other little word “garden”. A shed that sits, as the name suggests, in the garden is not easy to supply electricity to. The solution has in the past always involved laying out a power supply cable from the main house to the shed.

This then entails digging up vast tracts of garden for a trench in which to safely bury and protect said cable from the next oaf with a shovel. And even if you get that far it’s all a terrible fire risk anyway – sheds being wooden buildings and all.

Then there’s question of what exactly are you planning on doing in your shed that actually needs 220 volts (or a more wimpy 110v for US residents)? Of course, the number of different answers you might get to this question is proportional to the number of people you might ask.

You might want to over-winter tender plants, use it as a potting shed, or a simple workshop. Some folk just like to have a place they can go and read the newspaper or a book in peace, sheltered from the elements. More ambitious types might aim to setup a reasonably well equipped office or study complete with computers and basic heating.

However, there are certain elements you will need almost regardless of your specific plans for your shed. Chief amongst these has to be lighting – if you can’t see what you’re doing then you may as well call the whole thing off. Next comes any tools, appliances or other electrically powered devices. Finally you might want to give some thought to cooling/heating if it can get either very hot or cold where you are.

That’s where you’re going to need some power. But luckily all sheds share a useful characteristic, which is a large amount of otherwise wasted surface area (namely the roof) which is ideal as a platform for a solar panel or several.

The modern solar panel is an amazingly effective device that each day will tirelessly convert even the weakest sunlight (and even on an overcast day) into oodles of free electricity. Your job is simply to collect this and store it until you need to make use of it. Thankfully Count Alessandro Volta, an eminent Italian scientist, foresaw this need just a shade over 200 years ago when he developed the voltaic pile (i.e. the battery).

One of the many cute aspects of solar panels is that they invariably output 12 volts (thanks again Count Volta) DC which is coincidentally (or not) exactly what all “low-voltage” power packs, lighting and other appliances use as input. So when you’re using any of this kit during the day it’s automatically kept topped up on trickle charge, and the surplus can be diverted to a larger deep-cycle battery for use when the sun goes down.

Of course this pattern of collecting, storing and using solar generated electricity repeats more or less endlessly without ever costing anything to maintain or harming the environment. So whether you harbour ambitions to kit out a home office, pen a best seller, or simply have a den to lounge about in peace and comfort, a solar shed could be just the thing.

If you found this short article interesting then you’ll certainly want to check out this more in-depth article about solar sheds.

Filed Under Environment, Solar Energy Tagged With Environment, family, free power, garden, garden shed, green technology, home, low energy, shed, solar lighting, solar panels, solar power, solar shed
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