Great Green Idea: Green Furnishing: Use Heavy Thick Curtains for Summer, Passive Solar Heating In Winter

Use Heavy Thick Curtains for Summer, Passive Solar Heating In Winter

Light is a source of heat. Sunlight is a powerful heat source that for millions of years has kept our planet temperate enough to sustain life. Each day, massive amounts of solar energy reach the earth's surface. This energy is used by plants to grow and sustain us. Now, because human beings have flooded our atmosphere with too many greenhouse gases like carbon and methane, more and more of the heat from solar energy is trapped, driving the global average temperature higher and higher, faster and faster.

But we can use that solar energy and make it work for us-we human beings can and always have utilized the potentially destructive power of the sun to our advantage. We burn gas and other fuel to keep us warm, but there are many ways of harnessing the sun's energy to keep our homes warm in cold weather.

You don't need to assemble complicated, expensive arrays of solar panels in order to use sunlight as a source of heat in your home. Using smart construction, "passive" solar heating can be set up to warm nearly any building.

What passive solar heating requires is for the building's exterior windows to be set up at a certain height and angle so that the course of the sun in the summertime does not cast a great deal of light through them, but in the winter when the sun is lower, the sunlight will shine through the glass and transfer an impressive amount of heat to the interior space. This set-up requires some complex calculations, and depends on precise architectural planning which takes consideration of the environmental factors specific to the region as well as the exact area where the structure exists.

And as light keeps us warm, it follows that the absence of light can keep us cool. Keeping unnecessary solar light away from interior spaces can reduce or eliminate the need for air conditioning. Air conditioning is undesirable because of its ever-increasing cost, and more importantly, because of the unnecessary carbon emissions that it causes. Fans and dehumidifiers will help make a living space more comfortable, but there is still the issue of solar heat that enters the house through windows, then traps the heat exactly the way greenhouse gases in the atmosphere also trap solar heat.

An easy way to help resolve or prevent this is to block unnecessary light from entering your home. Invest in full-length window curtains that are hefty, thick and dense, and install them on all interior windows. When you intend to use a window, open the curtains as much as you need to. Otherwise, keep all of these heavy draperies closed. This method can cool down a building a great deal, without much money and without wasting energy. Always turn off all internal lights that are not being used, because these generate heat as well.

The sun is the reason we can exist on this planet Earth, and we have used its energy for the entire duration of human existence. With a careful trick of construction or remodeling, we can put solar radiation to use in a new way, and with shields against light we can stay cool when daytime temperatures rise. To take care of the planet, and to save energy costs, we can use the available light to our greater advantage.