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Looking at the average peak sunlight hours in Dawson is a valuable number for determining your solar power setup. Peak sunlight hours are only the hours a day in which the sunlight is strong enough for the solar panels to do their job. Not every hour of sunlight was created equal. For example, solar panels do not provide much use during early sunrise and sunset, and therefore you should not look at total hours of sunlight in a day, but instead focus on peak sunlight hours. Using this number will provide a much better estimate of your needs for setting up panels in Dawson, Pennsylvania.

Sunlight hits the earth directly at the equator. This is why the equator has a latitude of zero degrees. The latitude of Dawson is 40.0. Knowing the latitude of Dawson can help you plan for your solar panel setup, as the larger the latitude the more variance you will see throughout the year for total daily sunlight hours.

You will notice that the average peak sun hours for Dawson change based on the type of panel being used. The reason for this is quite simple. A fixed panel does exactly what it sounds like, remains fixed in one position at all times. A 1-axis and 2-axis panels have axis that allow them to rotate. The 1-axis rotates with the sun's daily east to west movement while a 2-axis also adjusts for seasonal changes.

Although weather predicting technology has greatly evolved over time, it is still a rather unpredictable factor that will affect the amount of peak sun hours your solar power system will receive. Cloudy days for example will usually have lower peak sun hours that a clear sunny day. And areas that usually have more average sunny days per year will probably have higher peak sun hours that areas that are often overcast or stormy.

We can use previous years of data to estimate the amount of peak sun hours in Dawson. A fixed tilt mount for example will receive 4.5 average hours per day. For more efficiency for your system in Dawson you could use a 1-axis tracking mount and increase your daily peak sun average to 5.4 hours, or even further with a 2-axis panel to get an average of 5.7 hours.