Climate change is one of the biggest challenges of our time. The increasing carbon dioxide emissions of our society leads to global warming, and this causes serious environmental problems, such as droughts, storms, floods and other extreme weather events, not only in our country, but worldwide. The consequences for us, people and nature are enormous. In order to meet this challenge, we have to reevaluate many things in our consumption, including our energy consumption. Therefore, we recommend that those who can, switch to renewable energy. But this will only have long-term positive effects if not only we as individuals strive for this, but also the companies and public institutions operating in our country steer their energy management in this direction.
Our country has favorable geographical and climatic features
Hungary has a favorable geographical location, with abundant sunshine throughout the year. With an average of more than 2,000 hours of sunshine per year, the country has significant solar energy potential.
Regarding the territorial distribution of the usability of solar energy, two data should be taken into account. One is the latitude and the other is the amount of cloud cover. In our country, the most radiation is experienced in the southern areas of Tiszántúl, it can even reach the value of 4800-4900 MJ/m2, the radiation is relatively higher in Transdanubia and in the southern regions of the Great Plain. We can experience the least amount of radiation in the area of the North Central Mountains, where values below 4300 MJ/m2 can be found here.
Why is this value that meteorologists use so important? Because we can easily convert this metric into kWh. All we have to do is divide the above values by 3.6. This means that the value of solar energy arriving in Hungary is between 1194 and 1361 kWh/m2 annually.
How can we take advantage of the favorable geographical and climatic conditions in our country?
Mainly a solar panel system installation. It is well known that solar panels only produce electricity during the day. However, it is not certain that we will be at home during this period, so we can cover approximately 30-40 percent of our electricity needs directly with a traditional system.
If we want to increase this percentage because we do not want to feed electricity back to the electricity supplier, or we currently do not have the opportunity to do so, then using batteries we can even increase the proportion of our own consumption to 60-80 percent. Therefore, for those who have been annoyed by high electricity costs for years, their own solar system is the perfect solution. In this way, we produce cheap and clean electricity ourselves during the entire lifetime. Most manufacturers give solar modules a 25-year performance guarantee, which means that they still provide at least 80 percent of the performance provided at the time of commissioning even after 25 years.
Increasing energy independence with a solar system
Home and business owners can also increase their energy independence by installing solar panels. Given that we can already cover a large part of our electricity needs with the solar system, our dependence on market energy prices is significantly reduced, so operating costs will be more predictable. In addition, unused excess energy can be stored using a battery system, in the case of residential users, we can also feed it into the network.
Independence from imported energy is also beneficial for the country
Hungary's move towards solar energy is driven by the desire to increase energy independence. By producing electricity from the sun, the country also reduces its dependence on imported energy sources. The pursuit of energy independence is in line with Hungary's sustainable and resilient energy vision.
The solar system is one of the ways of producing renewable energy that greatly contributes to climate protection. Since our country is also committed to significantly reducing the country's emissions of harmful substances in the coming years, serious developments are expected in this direction. Compared to traditional energy production methods, such as coal-fired power plants, solar systems are much more environmentally friendly and sustainable. In addition to zero emissions, this renewable energy system has other advantages. As far as we know, this source of energy is inexhaustible and available to anyone with access to sunlight. This reduces dependence on fossil fuels and increases the energy security of our country.
Environmental management and sustainability today
The future belongs to renewable energy, which includes solar energy. Several nuclear power plants have been closed in Europe in recent years, and high-emission coal-fired power plants are also being gradually shut down. Non-renewable energy sources, which primarily include petroleum, gas, lignite and black coal, are nearing the end of their operation, so the energy transition has already begun. In the future, new technologies must become cheaper and more profitable, as this is the only way to allow the continuous growth of businesses and the reduction of the population's burdens. Therefore, the future will definitely belong to cost-effective, environmentally friendly and independent renewable energy.