The solar hot water system pictured above is installed on a home which appeared in the  Parade of Homes Tour in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The very strict covenants in the neighborhood required a low profile arrangement that was not visible to any other neighbors. The roofing material is an EPDM rubber and the mounting hardware was installed before the roof was in place, which gave us the opportunity to make a seal that keeps the roof warranty. We usually, if possible, work with a roofer who has offered a warranty to assure that the client’s roof warranty is not effected by our installation, even in retrofit installations.

Also, the collectors are mounted on steel (not wood!). This is because steel in New Mexico lasts a very long time. (Conversely,  we would not use steel where humidity is high, like Florida.) All system parts are matched for lifecycle, from collectors, tanks, mounts, and piping. This is part of our formula to reduce life cycle costs. Proper professional mounting allows solar collectors to last through their full life span ( 20-50 years), and make normal roofing repairs/replacement easy.

The tank used in this solar thermal installation is an 80 gallon stainless steel tank with a double wall heat exchanger. We choose this tank for two reasons. First, the tank affords the protection of a double wall heat exchanger, which means that if the heat exchanger fails, we do not get Heat Transfer Medium (HTM) in the potable water system even though we used a low toxic solution (propylene glycol base). Also this means that if more water enters the HTM loop from the potable water side of the heat exchanger due to failure, we do no damage to the collectors in freezing conditions. This is minimum code in most places even though we see many systems without this feature.

The other reason we use this tank is because it is made of high quality stainless steel and carries a 10 year warranty. There is also no need for a “sacrificial anode rod” to help reduce corrosion on the tank. On regular steel glass-lined tanks this rod needs to be replaced periodically depending on water conditions.  Owning a solar system is really about cost of ownership. Stainless steel tanks cost quite a bit more, but the life is well beyond the 10 year warranty.

This system pictured supplies above 80% of hot water needs for this particular household of two and was installed during construction, so no before and after data is available.

The maintenance on this solar system is once every five years–check the antifreeze to make sure it is in good shape. We have similar systems that have not been serviced other than a check that have run with no troubles for over 15 years. Life expectancy of a system like this for the major components (collectors, tank, internal tank heat exchanger) is 20-40 years.

All of our solar heat exchanges are oversized compared to most standards. We do this for greater system efficiency and lower operating costs. This is critical in the Rocky Mountain regions of northern New Mexico where water is often hard. Our solar systems are designed to work in the harshest water conditions without a water softener except in extreme cases. If a water softener is required, your cost of ownership rises. This misses the objective of owning a solar system.

The Santa Fe solar hot water system pictured has been in service approximately 4 years at the time of this writing.

Larry Mapes is President and CEO of Valverde Energy, a solar heating company providing service for Taos, Santa Fe, Los Alamos and the surrounding areas in northern New Mexico. Please read our Solar Basics article and contact us for more information.

Solar Heat Panels in Los Alamos, New Mexico

Buying a solar energy system is a powerful and direct way to invest in your future, because you are buying the equipment to harvest free energy.

In many cases, depending on the energy source being displaced, the break even (when the money spent equals the money saved from energy use) can be from 5-15 years. Typically solar systems are designed to last 20-25 years plus. Valverde Energy maintains solar systems the founder installed 30 years ago in Santa Fe, Taos and Los Alamos homes that are still producing energy.

Many people in northern New Mexico install solar energy systems to reduce dependency on other energy sources or to be more energy independent, especially when there is an electrical or gas outage.

Other big picture views include reducing our dependency on foreign oil and reducing our carbon footprint. These two issues have huge impacts on the long term sustainability of our Country. In 2008 alone, the US sent out over $400 billion for oil imports alone, often sending our money to people who do not like us.

As far as carbon foot print and how it relates to Global Warming, solar is one of the best energy sources to reduce carbon output. Whether you regard Global Warming as a belief or a scientific fact, the stakes are very high if the predictions prove true. Too high to ignore.

Purchasing a solar energy system puts you in action by directly reducing your personal carbon footprint.

The moon passed between sun and earth last Sunday, casting a perfectly aligned shadow across a band of New Mexico stretching diagonally from Farmington to Roswell. According to the NASA website, a 90% alignment of the annular eclipse would be viewable in Taos. One hundred percent sounded much better to us, so we made a day trip of it, heading to Cochiti Lake, which turned out to the perfect spot for viewing the Ring of Fire.

Severe eye damage, including blindness, can result from looking straight into the sun–whether eclipsed of not–for long periods of time. Our first thought was to look through a telescope while wearing solar-equipped welder’s goggles, but a last-minute online search indicated even that was unsafe. The best solution? Project the telescopic image onto a some white paper–in this case a paper plate did just fine! The welder’s goggles worked incredibly well too and we were glad we had both options.

This image was shot through one of the welding goggle lenses.

And this is the how the projected image of the sun looked at the height of the eclipse!

And this is photograph was taken as the moon made it’s way out of the sun’s path. What an amazing experience it was to witness this rare solar event!

Photographs taken by Susan J. Preston, a Taos web designer who has specialized in the creation of websites, interactive presentations and animation since 1995. She is the webmaster for the Valverde Energy website and resides in Taos, New Mexico.

Larry Mapes speaking at the Renewable Energy Forum in Denver, May 2012

The North American Board of Certified Energy Practitioners (NABCEP) invited Larry Mapes to participate in a panel discussion during the American Solar Energy Society’s (ASES) World Renewable Energy Forum, held in Denver from May 13-17 of this year. The agenda–to discuss the importance of becoming a NABCEP certified solar installer. Mr. Mapes serves on the NABCEP Solar Thermal Task Committee which certifies solar thermal and solar PV installers for North America.

Fellow panel members included NABCEP Executive Director, Ezra Auerback; Blake Jones of Namste Solar and Andre Truitt of Truitt Renewable Energy Consulting.

What wasn’t surprising? Our solar customers throughout northern New Mexico including: Taos, Santa Fe, Los Alamos and Chimayo stayed warm and juiced up with sun-powered energy which, as you can see in the photograph of the roof of our Taos headquarters above, was bright as ever this morning.

Please read through our Solar Basics page for detailed information about installing solar panels, whether PV or solar thermal in your home or building.

Taos News ran a feature article on Larry Mapes, founder and CEO of Valverde Energy, a solar company in Taos,New Mexico, serving the entire northern New Mexico region including: Santa Fe, Los Alamos, Chimayo, Espanola and Taos! We are both excited and grateful for the thorough and well written article penned by Susan Carpenter Sims. Here’s an excerpt:

Read more about Taos, New Mexico solar energy company, Valverde Energy.

Photograph by photographer and Taos web designer, Susan J. Preston.

Taos, New Mexico is an unusual area for solar energy because of the very high solar resource and Taos architecture is varied and often experimental. Larry Mapes, the founder of Valverde Energy, has worked in the solar heating and solar electric field for 30 years in the Taos and Santa Fe region. During the last 30 years, most of the country experienced a solar DE-Renaissance, Northern New Mexico continued to be at the forefront of leading edge, cutting edge, and sometimes the bleeding edge of  solar technologies as it does today.

This learning environment has given Mr. Mapes a wealth of information of what works and what does not over a long test period in severe conditions. These years of observation have proven invaluable in designing and installing reliable solar energy systems and how best to integrate solar energy into each application. The knowledge and experience gained has lead to the formation of another company, ThermaSun. ThermaSun develops and manufactures repeatable solar thermal packages designed for low cost of ownership for the solar equipment owner. To learn more about ThermaSun, click here.