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An Introduction To Solar Powered Garden Buildings

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Attaching solar panels to garden sheds is starting to become almost commonplace and for a good reason. It used to be the case, not so very long ago, that for most people the shed was basically just a place for storing garden toys, tools, garden furniture and anything else that needed a place to hide away. But not any more.

Folk have begun to realize that the shed possesses potential to be far more than a simple garden store for mowers and garden accessories. Extra space is increasingly hard to find these days and only a fool would dismiss the possibility to develop the 100 or more square feet that even a modest 10 x 10 garden shed provides. This level of additional space is more than easily sufficient for installing a home office, setting up a personal studio, or even kitting out a functional gym.

However, none of this is going to amount to a hill of beans without electric power to operate lighting and assorted devices; and where getting power in a shed is concerned there are essential two options. First, run out a power cable; and second, place solar panels on the roof.

The first option will at the least involve running a suitably shielded cable from an existing mains power supply out to the shed. In fact, the best way to do this is to step the power down to a much safer 12v low voltage supply using a transformer. This is basically the same system as used for low power LED garden lights and mitigates many of the safety issues that would otherwise have to be addressed when running mains voltage electricity across a garden to a wooden shed.

Your second option is to attach as many solar panels as you need to the roof of the shed and connect them up to a battery (or set of batteries) to store the electricity. The amount of power you estimate you will need to use will determine the size and number of panels and batteries to install. Once that is done, it's really just a matter of connecting low energy high brightness LED lights and other low consumption devices to the battery and you're good to go.

But if even that simple process seems daunting, you can always opt instead for one of the many all inclusive solar shed light kits that provide all the necessary parts all designed for super easy installation. Interestingly, many brand new sheds these days often offer integral solar lighting kits pre-installed, such has been the recent growth in popularity of solar powered sheds.