Solar Panel

Power Facility

Directly generate electricity using sunlight, and the actual generation capacity is related to the planet's solar energy ratio. Not working at night, use accumulators can store excess energy during the day.

Energy Type		Photovoltaic
Basic Generation		360 kW
Made In		Assembler
Hand-Make		Replicator
Grid Size		3×3
Stack Size		50

1

6 s

10

5

Summary

Solar panels are a simple, effective, low-tech way of generating power in Dyson Sphere Program. They generate electricity when exposed to sunlight. Exact generation depends on the planet's solar energy ratio. The total energy generation of a solar panel over the course of a day depends on its location on the planet's surface and the local season.

Usage

Solar panels can be effectively paired with accumulators to keep the lights on overnight. Alternatively, many solar panels could be dispersed around the planet's surface (or wrapped in one continuous equatorial solar belt) to provide constant power without the need for energy storage.

It is important to keep in mind that, when accumulators are used, enough power must be generated not only to operate your facilities during the day time, but to store enough charge to operate them over the course of the night. One accumulator can draw a maximum of 1.5 MW from the grid to charge, and can hold up to 540 MJ (a limit which will usually not be reached on most planets during day time, since this would require 360 seconds of continuous sunlight); and discharge up to 2.25 MW. This means that each accumulator requires 5 solar panels (assuming 100% solar energy ratio) to attain max charge rate; so 10 solar panels are required to both charge an accumulator and power the portion of the factory that that accumulator will be powering during night time (assuming that the solar panels operate exactly 50% of the time).

Production Chain

Recipe	Building	Replicator?	Technology
1 6 s 10 10 5		✔

Components
Component	Time	Sub componet 1	Sub componet 2
1x	1 sec	1x
1x	2 sec	2x
2x	1 sec	2x	1x

Total Raw Materials

Materials
Item	Used for
6x
13x
20x

Player Tips & Tricks

- You can place your solar panels on and near both poles of a planet. This has two advantages compared to placing them near/around the equator: 1) each panel typically produces 30-80% more energy per planetary day because they will always be getting sunlight, even when the sun is at its farthest away point, and 2) it is possible to get a consistent supply of power with as few panels as desired, compared to placing them around the equator, which forces the player to evenly place panels around the entire equator. It should be noted that, the higher the axial inclination of the planet, the more energy a panel near the pole of the "Summer Zone" will produce per day compared to a panel near the pole of the "Winter Zone". However, the further away the panel is from the pole, the less this effect is visible.