Without going deeply into the electronic technical details, here is a diagram of the way the system components are hooked up. Ask your favorite solar system installer for his recommendations on particular manufacturers. The basic setup is really quite simple.
I don’t get involved much in interior decorating, so I don’t care what kind of table lamps you buy. My job does involve including on the plans for the contractors what kind of installed lighting fixtures will require electrical boxes, mountings, and installed fixtures. There are a staggering number of good website catalogs for shopping for lighting fixture styles. You can shop for them now and specify them for the plan, or we can specify only the type of fixture on the plan, and you shop locally when you are ready to attached them. For the architectural planning, I need to know the locations of the fixtures, and whether they are recessed, flush, semi-flush, wall-mounted, tracks, pendents, sconces, or chandeliers.
Here are some nice lighting catalogs for you. Have fun shopping.
http://www.lightinguniverse.com/
http://lightingbygregory.com/index.html
http://lightingfixtures.com/index.asp
In all cases, I recommend using flourescent or LED bulbs in the lights, but not flourescent fixtures, which tend to be stark and commercial in appearence. Remember, if you want to use LED bulbs, which last forever, and hardly burn any electricity, you will want to add a few extra fixtures here and there to compensate for the lower brightness of LED lighting.
For a small home, using electricity, or propane, or natural gas, to heat the house, or just for hot water, this “Munchkin” boiler is among the very best purchases on the market.
http://www.radiantheatproducts.com/store.asp?pid=3408&catid=10050
However, much depends upon the destination and use of the hot water in your building. If you want to research the rest of them, the same website is a good place to start.
The art of saving energy requires making a large list of ways to reduce consumption, and acting on all of them. The cummulative list of small changes adds up to a large savings. That being said, changing to compact flourescent light bulbs is already a pretty big improvement all by itself. They claim to last 10 years. What I learned from an electrician is that compact flourescents loose a little life every time you turn them on. So you have to decide when in the evening that you really need them, turn them on and leave them on until you don’t need them any more, then shut them off for the night. No more following the kids around, shutting off lights, but you have to change habits to conserve. They also contain mercury, so you have to be conscientious when you dispose of them. On the bright side, they use only 1/4 (25 percent) of the electricity of standard bulbs. I use them in my whole house. As a society, we must re-evaluate how much light we need to function and just plain cut back. Dim lighting is quite relaxing, and you will be going to bed not long after dark anyway. Put windows in smart places for daytime lighting.
http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=cfls.pr_cfls
Light Emitting Diode LED Bulbs use much less energy than flourescent bulbs, but they don’t cast as much light and might sometimes require two bulbs in the place of one. On the bright side, LEDs are very durable, and ideal for decoratively lit objects in lobbies, illuminating signs and walkways, emergency lights, and many more places. I use them to illuminate my canvas when I paint because the light is more natural white, and they don’t cause much glare.