Alternative Energy Solutions for Home and Small Business

The current movement of equipping homes with alternate energy sources (be it wood-burning stoves and boilers, coal, ethanol and other bio-fuels, windmills, waterwheels, hydrogen fuel cells, or solar panels) needs a durable solution for alternate energy, which can last well into the future. This is necessary if we have to be self-sufficient in our energy needs and reduce or eliminate our dependency on unstable hostile nations for our supply of fossil fuels.

It might be worth considering to take our energy independence to another level yet and to reduce our dependency on oil companies and electricity companies. There are a number of options becoming available on the alternative energy market for home that might be able to provide sustainable and affordable electricity while reducing carbon emissions. More and more individuals at homes as well as at small business outfits are trying these options and the results so far are promising.

Microgeneration, according to Wikipedia, is the generation of zero or low-carbon heat and power by individuals, small businesses and communities to meet their own needs. It includes technologies like small-scale wind turbines, hydroelectric plants, photovoltaic solar systems, ground source heat pumps, and Micro Combined Heat and Power (MicroCHP) installations.

Microgeneration has been made popular by movies (such as The Mosquito Coast, Jericho, The Time Machine, Beverly Hills Family Robinson), TV-shows, specialized magazines (such as OtherPower and Home Power) and websites (such as Instructables, Practical Action) which give practical guidance, raising interest for it in the general public and increasing popularity by proposing Do-it-yourself solutions which can decrease the cost of microgeneration even further.

Carbon Free is a UK based company that carries out research and analysis in a wide range of alternative energy related fields and disseminate results in their reports. A report by Carbon Free on "Householders as Energy Providers" indicates that energy companies are already using microgeneration to open up new markets. They cite the example of electrically powered, ground based, geothermal heating systems that are replacing oil central heating, and mention how electricity companies are coming to regard geothermal technology as a tool to expand electricity sales.

They conclude that as the traditional energy prices continue to go up, microgeneration will be to home energy what internet is to home communication and this will impact the energy companies significantly. This will lead to retail electricity market as well as infrastructure for generating, transmitting and distributing energy being restructured.

Carbon Free also summarizes their conclusion for a few of the alternate energy sources. They suggest that solar hot water technology, being cheap and simple to use, can be a cost effective way to reduce domestic heating bills. However it is expensive to install. Solar photovoltaic technology, while simple to install, is expensive to use. Small-scale wind turbines are cost effective to produce electricity for households. However low cost turbines are hard to find.

As energy prices rise, the growth of renewable energy solutions will be supported, stimulating the market for a wide range of energy storage. Companies with the infrastructure to store and distribute energy will dominate the renewable energy sector. In near future, fuel cells will also carve out a niche market within the residential energy sector.