What is SolarCoin?

Around 3 months ago, one of my friends introduced me to a cryptocurrency called SolarCoin that incentivizes those who generate electricity using solar energy. According to the SolarCoin website, "§1 SolarCoin represents 1 MWh of solar electricity generation." With solar energy use rising everyday, SolarCoin definitely has a bright future! I personally think SolarCoin is a great long term investment and the community has been very active in producing awesome projects! At the beginning of 2016, a new SolarCoin project called ElectricChain announced its goal for the community to come together and help find ways to use solar energy data on the SolarCoin blockchain, you can view the announcement here.

The SolarCoin logo

Why I think SolarCoin is a good long term investment

I believe that SolarCoin is a good long term investment for multiple reasons:

• Solar energy usage is increasing, the Solar Energy Industry Association (SEIA) states that over the past decade solar has "experienced an annual compound growth rate of 60%" [1].

Chart from the SEIA showing solar energy growth

• The cost of installing solar panels is becoming cheaper.
• SolarCoin is supporting a good cause, solar energy helps the environment by reducing harmful emissions caused by methods such as burning coal.
• The community is full of very intelligent people such as the CEO Nick Gogerty who has a strong background in financial management.

How to get SolarCoins

There are two ways to acquire SolarCoins: 1) To send your solar energy generation data to the SolarCoin Foundation in return for SolarCoins 2) To buy them through an exchange such as Bittrex or Poloniex. You can estimate the value of your SolarCoin claim here.

The safest place to hold SolarCoins is on a local SolarCoin wallet on your computer, this will avoid losses in the case that the exchange that you bought them from goes down.