Complete article at Live Science
“Tired of your roof just soaking up rays and not pulling its load? You’re not alone. Increasing numbers of people are putting their roofs to work generating electricity. And that does not necessarily mean installing unsightly steel-and-glass solar energy modules.
“Today you can get photovoltaic shingles (or tile, or slate) that will do the job and still look like a roof.
“For instance, the National Institute of Standards and Technology has been testing various forms of photovoltaic roofing products for the past year on roofs in Maryland to calibrate their output. Brian Dougherty, project manager, said the test includes tile (popular in the Southwest), slate (popular in Europe) and shingle (popular everywhere). All of them have inactive areas where the roofer can drive nails and not short out any circuits.
“The result of the NIST test, expected later this year, will be a technical report on the underlying technologies rather than a buyer’s guide to brand names, Dougherty said. But he said that efficiency ranges from 6 percent of the incoming solar power being converted to electricity, to about 16 percent.
” “Shingles are just getting started—most of the market is still roof-mounted modules,” cautioned Paul Maycock, president of Photovoltaic Energy Systems Inc. in Williamsburg, VA…”
Sounds like something to be considered when looking at new construction. Especially a temple construction — that would be good positioning with the growing awareness of global warming.
