Capturing the Sun in our Homes

100 years ago,  Thomas Edison, inventor of the light bulb had a conversation with Henry Ford. He is recorded as saying, “We are like tenant farmers chopping down the fence around our house for fuel when we should be using Natures inexhaustible sources of energy — sun, wind and tide. ... I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”

That was 100 years ago. Henry Ford’s imagination had been captured by the possibilities that existed around petroleum, and Edison was enamored with the potential of electricity, but even at that time, they saw that oil and coal would run out – and then what?

I am amazed at what has been developed with respect to the capture of solar energy, even though there has been minimal economic incentive to work at that. The inspiration for solar energy development has been that of Edison—vision.

50 years ago I tinkered with laying a black hose in the sun in order to get hot water for a shower. It worked – on a hot day, and that’s as far as I took it. It was so much easier to turn on the tap and draw hot water from the hot water tank, water which had been heated by electricity generated many miles away.

Thankfully others did not leave it at that. Thankfully others continued working at capturing the heat of the sun. The technology now exists that will heat the hot water you use in your home using the energy of the sun. This will work effectively most days of the year, even in winter, and on many days there will be more heat energy than what is needed for hot water. That heat can be used to heat your home. The technology exists! It is well established! Just talk to Lorena Mitchell at Evolve Green, a Steinbach based alternate energy company. 

And advocates of solar thermal installation maintain that the payback time for solar hot water systems is very reasonable – five or six years.

An aspect of the technological development of solar thermal that I find impressive is that it has proceeded with minimal subsidy compared to the huge subsidies we give to Big Oil, and to some extent also to Manitoba Hydro. This development has been driven primarily by people who have been passionate about finding ways of living that avoid the depletion of limited natural resources and our total dependency on distant energy sources, which by that very nature, are vulnerable to disruption.

Eric Rempel