A solar water heater is a system that heats water using sunlight captured by a solar thermal collector, circulating either the water itself or a separate heat transfer fluid through the sun facing collector and into a storage tank, either passively through natural convection or actively with a pump. Clarence Kemp of Baltimore built the first commercial solar water heater, the batch type Climax heater, in 1896, simply enclosing a blackened tank inside a wooden box to trap solar heat, and flat plate collectors of the kind still common today came into wider use in Florida and Southern California during the 1920s. Israel became the technology leading adopter after its government mandated solar water heaters in all new homes by 1980, and today Barbados, Austria, Cyprus, Israel and Greece lead the world in solar water heaters installed per person. By the end of 2023 the world installed solar hot water capacity had reached 560 gigawatts thermal across roughly 122 million systems, with China accounting for the largest share of the global market, followed by the United States and Turkey.
Facts
Technology TypeSolar thermal conversion 1 Invented YearThe article records solar collector records in the United States before 1900 in general; 1896 is the specific, named first batch water heater, the earliest single-year invention claim the article gives. Connections
Associated With
Solar water heaters and concentrated solar power both convert solar radiation directly to heat rather than electricity.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Solar water heating
History section, Clarence Kemp paragraphQuote, History section, Clarence Kemp paragraph
In 1896 Clarence Kemp of Baltimore enclosed a tank in a wooden box, thus creating the first "batch water heater" as they are known today.
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