Making cheap solar panels that I can use for growing clean food at home?

I was doing some research, and will continue to do more, but I was wondering if anyone else thought it'd be feasible to make solar panels which would be positioned above a hydroponic growing system for edible plants?

I was thinking with the pollution we have, chemicals we use to spray our plants/food with, it would be an awesome idea to try and grow something completely clean, and since this is the survival forms I would like to add it wouldn't be a bad thing in case of a tragedy were to fall upon us.

If anyone here has any knowledge they could share about growing plants hydroponically with solar panels involved, and/if it would be something a novice could scrounge together please share.

Cheap Solar Panels



I was thinking about using a panel like this to possibly support a simple hydroponic growing system for essential foods - maybe finding a way to reflect natural light using a mirror design and keeping the food growth as purified as possible.

I haven't completely finished thinking up this concept yet, nor am I inept at doing so at the moment do to my lack of knowledge in the area's I'm so fascinated on at the moment.

Anyway, please let me know if you have any ideas to add, or anything you've possibly built that was inexpensive, and able to built with a novice or two at hand.

reply to post by highlyoriginal


I do think I have seen plans online to build solar panels. I'll have to get back to ya that. China sells solar eveything for cheap, of course they do. Do you slave for a greenhouse? Check this video out about a year round greenhouse, self heated during winter, produces a ridiculous amount of food

I currently grow 3 types of lettuce, some spinach, and tamed wild greens indoors in trays under T5s. I haven't had store lettuce for salads in a year. I do pick up dressing and organic tomatoes but I think I may add a full sized cart soon and begin with micro-greens as well.

With the recent power outage half started to flower within 2 days. The plant were like i said very old but if the power wasnt off im sure they could have been kept in semi stasis and only producing a leaf or two a day for each.

I have a couple small boxes with LEDs i havent gotten around to setting in into framed boxes.

Am growing entirely in 3 inch pots of fully organic soil and was feeding wormcasting and guano tea. The roots hang down into the gutters in the trays and drink solution just like hydro. chose all the methods and points and put them together. The trays are fill once per day or every other day. the tiny pots all have soggy soil so you could go three between waterings. Passive/evaporative is the name of this method.

reply to post by Shadowalker


I'll definitely have too do some more research before I go ahead and start any sort of project, but I wouldn't mind giving this a try either.

I would love to not have to rely on shelling out money for the groceries, not to mention getting my own clean food.

I don't know a whole lot about plants, but I built a solar water heating system this past summer for heating my pool. This could easily be adapted to work for heating shower water or a number of other things.

It was actually really simple. Nail two boards into a big plus. as big as you want. Coil irrigation pipe into a big coil. As big as you want. I think I used 200' of pipe. I put it on my roof and pumped water from the pool, through the pipes back to the pool. On any given day, say mid 80's, I was getting 3-4degrees warmer than the pool.

Not sure if this helps at all, but figured I'd offer it up.

reply to post by highlyoriginal


I've done some hydroponic growing. I don't think I would give solar panels much thought. As a reflector, they would be poor as they're designed to catch energy. I'm not sure just how much charge one could get from a bulb, but it would not make up for the loss of a reflector.

I don't think you'll be able to produce enough watts or lumens to keep things alive and healthy with just a small cheap solar panel. Especially on shady days when there's no sun. I think your best bet is LED lighting as they cost next to nothing in electricity and produce little to no heat. They're a little pricey though. T5 flourescent lights or CFL's is the next easiest and cheapest.

There are articles on how to make your own LED lighting box with christmas lights.
www.elementalled.com...