Last year, Williams along with Amherst, Smith, Hampshire, and Bowdoin announced that they would collaborate in a purchase and development of a solar electricity site, the NEC Renewable Partnership. The site found its location in Farmington, Maine on land that used to operate as a… Continue reading »
Williams, Amherst, Smith, Hampshire (and sometimes UMass Amherst) are working on several joint projects – we’re hoping to amplify our impact, and we help keep each other sane and on track. One project we’re calling the Community Climate Fund. (Read more about it here.) The other is related… Continue reading »
This is an evacuated tube solar collector system installed in the summer of 2009. It supplies preheated hot water to the buildings’ domestic hot water system, decreasing the amount of fossil fuel necessary for hot water generation. Continue reading »
This is an evacuated tube solar collector system installed in the summer of 2009. It supplies preheated hot water to the buildings’ domestic hot water system, decreasing the amount of fossil fuel necessary for hot water generation. For more about how solar hot water works, visit the… Continue reading »
In late 2006, Williams installed a solar hot water system on Fort Hoosac, a dormitory that houses 13 graduate students from the History of Art Program. The system consists of evacuated tube solar collectors that absorb the sun’s energy and convert it to heat. That heat is then… Continue reading »
Solar thermal systems convert sunlight to heat that can be used for space heating, space cooling, and domestic hot water. The core of these systems is the solar collectors. There are several different kinds of solar collectors, the most common of which are flat plate and evacuated tube. Solar collectors convert the sun's energy most efficiently when the sun’s rays hit them at a ninety degree angle. In the United States, the sun is always in the southern part of the sky and is higher in the summer and lower in the winter. That means that solar collectors are most effective when they’re installed facing south and tilted towards the south. The degree of the tilt determines what part of the year the solar panels are optimized for: the greater the slant, the more the panels are optimized for production during the fall, spring, and winter when the sun is low in the sky. Continue reading »
