It's January and the solar thermal pump started working! Woohoo, that's free energy folks...
I've been burning wood at a rate that is causing me distress. We've nearly used up one load of wood this winter and we'll soon be eating into the second load... but on a sunny day we can hold fire on lighting the err, fire until well into the afternoon when the sun is close to setting. Morning sun streaming through the windows makes the house pretty warm. OK you need sunglasses to avoid being blinded but that's fine as long as I can take time off from lighting the sodding fire. It is a pain in the backside to be honest but we are much more in tune with our surroundings, the season and our energy usage so overall we're still happy with our decisions (I think).
The solar thermal turning on today was a real bonus though. Are we on the way to spring already? Unlike photovoltaics (PV) our collector panel needs direct sunlight to heat it up and when it reaches a certain temperature the pumps turn on and the heat is collected in the thermal storage tank. I've not noticed it working since October last year so to have it work so early this year is great. While south is the most efficient direction for a solar panel to face ours faces south west, it only sees the sun in the afternoon and with it being winter the suns trajectory is so low that it barely heats up. As the year progresses the sun sits higher in the sky and we get lots more free hot water.
