EcoRadio KC is glad to encourage awareness and protection of our world. Our goal is to ensure our listeners are aware of how we can create a sustainable present for a sustainable future! We experience more extreme temperatures because of global energy increase. As we move to the future, it will take all of us to make the world habitable for millennia to come.
Monday, we will hear about how to use the sun to charge your car then use your car to run your house! We will replay our show from July 31, 2025 when host Richard Mabion spoke with Kent Rowe and Jennifer Connelly, owners of that house near Wichita. Kent is an Executive Committee member of the Kansas Chapter of Sierra Club, State Energy Chair, and Conservation Chair of the Wichita Chapter. He is a co-founder of Society of Alternative Resources which was instrumental in garnering an Executive Proclamation establishing City of Wichita's Sustainability Integration Board. Kent is a frequent writer for the Kansas Chapter of the Sierra Club Waypoints publication and lectures to groups in topics on sustainability, renewable energy, and microgrid electrification.
The use of bidirectional solar collectors is made possible using direct to grid converters, more commonly known as a grid-tie inverters or solar inverters, which convert direct current (DC) electricity from sources like solar panels into alternating current (AC) electricity that matches the voltage and frequency of the electrical grid. This allows the electricity to be used in homes and businesses or sent back to the utility company for credit. For high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission, specialized converter stations are used to step up or step-down voltage for long-distance transport. An inverter is one of the most important pieces of equipment in a solar energy system. It’s a device that converts direct current (DC) electricity, which is what a solar panel generates, to alternating current (AC) electricity, which the electrical grid uses. In direct current, electricity is maintained at constant voltage in one direction. With alternating current electricity, the flow goes in both directions in the circuit as the voltage changes from positive to negative. Inverters are just one example of a class of devices called power electronics that regulate the flow of electrical power.
Fundamentally, an inverter accomplishes the DC-to-AC conversion by switching the direction of a DC input back and forth very rapidly. As a result, a DC input becomes an AC output. In addition, filters and other electronics can be used to produce a voltage that varies as a clean, repeating sine wave that can be injected into the power grid. The sine wave is a shape or pattern the voltage makes over time, and it’s the pattern of power that the grid can use without damaging electrical equipment, which is built to operate at certain frequencies and voltages.
The first inverters were created in the 19th century and were mechanical. A spinning motor, for example, would be used to continually change whether the DC source was connected forward or backward. Today we make electrical switches out of transistors, solid-state devices with no moving parts.
The growth of solar in the United States provides a tremendous opportunity to address some of the greatest challenges faced by lower-income communities: the high cost of housing, unemployment, and pollution. At this time, we cannot fail to calculate the need for all citizens to have shelter which protects from ravages of record-breaking temperatures. Solar can provide long-term financial relief to families struggling with high and unpredictable energy costs. Solar can provide living-wage jobs in an industry where the workforce has increased 168% over the past seven years, and solar can provide a source of clean, local energy sited in communities that have been disproportionately impacted by traditional power generation.
This discussion will educate listeners about how easy this is to do and encourage us all to GET STARTED!
EcoRadio KC supports the work for a future in which humans flourish as members
of a thriving ecosphere. We are all in this together and it will take all of us to make the world safe. This will be a great radio hour!
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“The whole world is one neighborhood.” Franklin D. Roosevelt
