Books and Articles by Rik DeGunther

This cheat sheet offers basic information about solar power and how the structure of solar panel and battery installations work to save money on electricity needs. It also presents how upfront financing for solar power projects works and how solar power functions on various scales — from homes and businesses to entire cities or regions.

The words “solar power” often bring to mind solar panels and photovoltaic (PV) solar systems, but you can harness the sun’s energy in a number of smaller ways. The practical and affordable solar projects listed here are ones anyone can build or take advantage of. They explain how to use solar energy to purify drinking water, enjoy a portable shower, and cool your house.

Boosting the efficiency of your swimming pool is an important first step in reducing your carbon footprint and moving toward a more sustainable lifestyle. Here's how to make your swimming pool energy efficient so that when you add solar, you get the most bang for your buck: Reduce bends in the piping: Sharp bends in the PVC piping slow down the flow and require more power to do the same job.

You can heat your pool using solar power. Your pool system already includes the pump, controller, and filter, along with PVC pipes that route the water flow. Simply break into the PVC line after the filter and run a couple of flex hoses (or PVC, if you prefer) to the solar collector panel, which you can lay out on the ground or set against a hill to achieve some tilt toward the sun.

Radiant floor heat systems use solar power to heat water, which is then pumped through your home's floor. You can use solar-heated water to heat your home off-grid. Radiant heat, without solar, costs much less than forced-air heating for efficiency reasons. Installing a radiant heat floor system is almost surely not a do-it-yourself project, but it merits elaboration because it's such a complete and effective way to use solar energy water heating.

If you want to make alternative energy a part of your life, either through your car, home, or at work, you should understand some basic energy terminology and the various alternative energy sources being used and developed.

Coming up with alternative energy sources is essential due to the energy demands of a growing population and dwindling supplies of fossil fuels. This list is an overview of available alternative sources of energy: Biofuels: Biofuels are made of biomass products and can be used to generate electric power as well as fuel transport.

If you want to get involved in the alternative energy conversation (and understand what you read and hear), learning these basic terms about energy is a good place to start: Alternative energy: Energy sources that don’t include fossil fuels or carbon-combustible products such as gasoline, coal, natural gas, and so on BTU (British Thermal Unit): The basic unit of energy in the English system Energy: The total amount of effort, or work, it takes to accomplish a certain task Energy efficiency: The ratio of the useful work obtained from a process to the raw power taken to achieve that process First law of thermodynamics: A key physics principle stating that energy can neither be created nor destroyed (that is, energy is never used up; it simply changes forms) Joule (J): The basic unit of energy in the international system Power: The speed with which energy is being expended to achieve a task Renewable energy: Forms of energy that constantly replenish themselves with little or no human effort Second law of thermodynamics: The physics principle stating that the disorder of any closed system can only increase — that waste is unavoidable Sustainable energy: Forms of energy that are not only renewable but also have the ability to keep Earth’s ecosystem up and running in perpetuity Watt: Power is energy per time, and the standard unit of measurement is the watt.