Many of us are looking for more ways to live in manners that are more friendly for our environment. And one of the things that many people are turning towards is solar power. Solar power is an amazing renewable energy source that is helping to save our planet’s valuable resources. And luckily for all of us, there are many innovations being made in the solar power industry.

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Here are 3 recent innovations in solar power:

1. Installation Innovations

Many solar panel companies are coming out with panels that are easier to install. By innovating the snaps, attachment plates, panels, etc of solar panels, these companies have been able to significantly reduce the time it takes to install solar panels. Labor costs can take up about 30% of the cost of solar panels. So savings in installation time can equate to large savings in the overall costs of a solar panel system. Because of this, commercial and residential solar panel customers are able to receive significant savings in the costs to have their solar panels installed.

Main benefit this innovation brings: decreases costs.

2. Robot Installation

Not only are many companies finding ways to make solar panel installation easier (and thus less expensive), but some companies have even begun to toy with the idea of being able to have robots install solar panels. In fact, a company in Germany has actually been able to create a robot that can install solar panels. These robots can install these solar panels 24/7, no matter what the weather conditions are. Not only do these robots not have limitations on when they can install panels, but they take about 8 times less time to install the panels than traditional methods, and one robot does the job of about 10 humans.

Main benefit this innovation brings: The first benefit this innovation brings is that, because these robots are so effective, their owners can save a lot of money on installation labor costs (which they can hopefully pass on to their customers). On top of that, I think that using robots in place of humans to install solar panels also brings an added measure of safety to humans with them not having to take on all of the risks of these installations.

3. Robot Washing

Speaking of robots, they are involved in another recent innovation in the solar energy arena. And students are actually the ones who came up with this idea. A few students from the California Institute of Technology and UCLA won a recent contest at UCLA. What was their innovation that they won with? Robots that clean solar panels. The “Greenbiotics” robotic solar panel cleaning vehicle is a computer operated cleaning system for solar panels. Once the cleaning robot is placed onto the solar panel system, it is controlled by a computer and moves across the panels while cleaning them. It uses very small amounts of water (so no water waste here).

Main benefit this innovation brings: The inventors of the robot solar panel cleaners claim that, by creating cleaner panels, they are able to increase the efficiency of the solar panels.

Nicole writes for Solar myWorld. They supply a range of solar energy driven products. Find solar panels Perth.