SAILING WITH SOLAR: A BEGINNER’S GUIDE

Solar Energy is becoming one of the best ways to generate clean, efficient, and renewable energy when you are out on the water. For this reason alone, people are switching to solar energy for their Sailboats, and so should you! In this blog, we will be going over what it means to sail with Solar. We’ll cover topics such as what you need, what applications you can use them for, and whether it’s all worth it or not.

Sailboats are a very unique class of vessels. For one, they utilize old technology in terms of propulsion, mixed with years of perfection, to create a vessel that is virtually self-sustaining. Onboard most sailboats, you have a hydroelectric generator that transforms water flow into electricity. But this only helps when you are moving. What if you are anchored out in the water and want passive power? This is where solar energy becomes your best option and the ideal choice for powering your vessel.

The average sailboat comes equipped with either one or two batteries, each of them usually holding around 100Ah worth of power. With that amount of power, you should be able to run small refrigerators, lights, electronics, electric grills, coffee makers, and a couple of other appliances for a decent amount of time. In this case, you can install solar panels on your vessel and use the sun’s energy to power your appliances and electronics directly or you can use it to charge and/or maintain your sailboats’ batteries.

Other than solar panels, you will need a solar charge controller to help regulate the amount of power your battery is receives. This will also make your solar panel more effective at maintaining its efficiency and will allow your battery to sustain consistent charge levels. There are plenty of solar charge controllers on the market that are waterproof, which will alleviate the headache of having to constantly worry if it will get damaged when it gets wet.

Another important factor in having solar energy be a part of your vessel is the fact that you will need a power inverter. This is all dependent on the wattage your appliances run at, as well as how long you plan to have them running. Tip: The less time you run your appliances; the less amount of power is drawn from your battery.

The installation is typically the easiest part of going solar on your marine vessel. Depending on your vessel’s size and your desired solar panels, you can mount them on the railing, on the top of the cabin, or even on top of the spray hoods/awnings with our semi-flexible solar panels. Whichever works best given your desired application.

So, to close out this blog, we must answer this question. Is Solar Energy worth it on Marine Vessels, whether they be Sailboats or any other vessel? The answer is a Soaring Yes! There are too many benefits in going solar for it not to be worth it.

I hoped you enjoyed our introduction to Sailing with Solar. We will have a more advanced take on this topic in a future blog, so make sure to be on the lookout for that.

If you would like to see the products we offer for your Marine Vessel, be sure to visit our Marine Collection.