So when do I need to angle my solar panel?
The angle of the sun in the sky depends on both the season and your location on
the earth:
In winter the sun is lower in the sky. In summer the sun is higher in the sky.
And the closer you live to the equator (i.e. the lower your latitude), the higher the
sun is in the sky all year round.
So you may think that calculating the optimum angle for the panels is going to be
really complicated… Luckily it is actually dead simple, take a look at the example
below.
Does the amount of tilt matter?
Yes – the tilt of your solar panels will affect how
much power they produce because the tilt will
affect how much sunlight you capture.
Consider a solar panel flat on the ground that is
1m wide.
When the sun is high in the sky (e.g. at midday
in summer), then a 1m wide shaft of sunlight will
be completely captured by that solar panel:
Now, if the sun is at an angle of 30°
from horizontal, that same 1m wide
shaft of light actually is spread out
over 2m when it hits the ground:
The flat solar panel, in this example,
will only get half the sunlight, and
therefore produce half the energy
compared to the sun being directly
overhead.
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