The U.S. has way more sun than Germany, yet Germany continues to beat the U.S. in total solar installations by a wide margin.

If you’re a solar geek (like me ;-), you’ve probably read that Germany saw about three gigawatts of new solar installations in the month of December alone, or more than two times as much new solar installed as was installed in the entire U.S. in all of 2011.

This, in a country about 1/23^rd the size of the lower 48 U.S. and in a country that gets, on average, about as much sun as the state of Alaska.

Following a two-inch snowfall on Jan. 7, I had cleared our lower 13-panel string with a Mr. Longarm by 9 a.m. Within one hour, it was producing, full tilt -- but the upper string, which I couldn't reach, took several hours longer to shed its snow.

At the risk of turning SolarChargedDriving.Com into SnowOnSolarPanels.Com, here’s a quick update on our ongoing experience and growing expertise with snow covering our 5.59 kW system here in Aurora, Colo.

[In fact, as far as I can tell, no one on the Web is writing as consistently about snow on solar panels as SolarChargedDriving.Com. In that sense, we’re giving you something new, fresh and useful that you can’t get anywhere else!]

EV owners would be sitting comparatively pretty compared to the rest of us were Iran to follow through on threats to blockade the Straight of Hormuz (where the red arrow points).

So, how are you feeling now that tensions are rising in the Persian Gulf over Iran’s possible drive to develop nuclear weapons?

[In case you don't know, Iran has threatened to blockade the entrance to the Persian Gulf if Western powers follow through on threats to impose an oil embargo on one of the biggest political thorns in the West’s side.]

The answer probably depends in part on whether you’ve got a plug-in vehicle, or are about to get one soon.

Snow cover can shut down your solar system for days and days, even in blue-sky, sunny conditions, as our own experience in Aurora, Colo. has repeatedly shown us.

We haven’t come up with the ideal solution yet – and clearly neither has the solar industry – but below are some different approaches to dealing with snow-covered solar panels.