Fostering the use of renewable energies for power generation is at the heart of the EU's long term energy policy. Accordingly, the European Commission and literally all member states have set up ambitious installations targets for alternative energy sources. These aims can only be reached by...

When designing a building energy system based on renewable energy sources, a major challenge is the suitable sizing of its components. In this paper, a simulation tool is presented for determining the optimal sizes of the main components of a stand-alone building energy system which integrates...

Oil crises in the past years made more obvious the dependency of economies on fossil fuels. As a consequence, the need for new energy sources became more urgent. Renewable energy sources could provide a solution to the problem, as they are inexhaustible and have less adverse impacts on the...

Globally, there is still widespread dependence on traditional forms of energy, and human and animal power still contribute a significant proportion of the energy used in the rural areas of developing countries. After biomass, they are the most important energy sources for their populations. On a...

The paper presents a new type of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) suitable for exploitation watercourse with periodical-temporary water flow. This innovative solution consist of Hydroelectric Plant (HEP) and solar Photovoltaic (PV) generator working together as one hybrid power plant, producing...

Regardless their high potential, renewable energy resources are insufficiently exploited in Europe. This paper examines the potential of social marketing for renewable energy sources. It uses acceptability and willingness to pay results from existing surveys on renewable energy sources and...

Cyprus is a small island situated in the north-eastern Mediterranean with no indigenous conventional energy sources, away from interconnected networks of electricity and gas. Recently, Cyprus won the prestigious World Renewable Energy Congress Trophy for its remarkable efforts and initiatives to...

The energy sector of the European Union (EU) is based mainly on fossil fuels and almost two-thirds of the energy demand is imported. In the future, fossil fuels are expected to strengthen their participation in the European energy balance and imports will amount to 70% of overall energy needs....

Photovoltaic technology is used worldwide to provide reliable and cost-effective electricity for industrial, commercial, residential and community applications. The average lifetime of PV modules can be expected to be more than 25 years. The disposal of PV systems will become a problem in view...

In this paper, the development of wireless data acquisition system (WDAS) for weather station monitoring is described. It is based on the Emitter/Receiver architecture and it does not require the physical connection of the monitored systems to the data collection server. The proposed system...