Best practices

Two years ago, Storm Uri unleashed a deep freeze over Texas, causing widespread power outages that affected more than 4.5 million people. The drastic changes in temperature during the storm not only reduced natural gas production and froze wind turbines across the State, but also had widespread impacts on solar plants.

Storing and dispatching power at the optimal time requires an extremely granular understanding of how much power a project is generating both now and in the immediate future. Developers, operators, and owners increasingly require high-frequency (1-minute) weather and solar irradiance data that enables them to make quick, accurate and financially effective decisions.

As solar projects grow in size and number, the challenges of integrating them successfully into national grids increase as well. The intermittency of solar energy requires careful management, and solar developers that under- or over-produce face curtailment and penalties from grid operators.

March 2022 saw Spain suffer its biggest solar irradiance decline in 28 years. By contrast, Germany and the Balkans saw 45% higher levels of solar irradiance. These anomalies highlight need to invest in effective interconnections and forecasting to support European energy independence.

Designing and operating a large-scale solar project without fully understanding its potential output inevitably increases risks throughout its lifecycle. One part of the solution for developers is validated solar resource data calculated through satellite-based models, helping produce accurate energy yield calculations.

A key goal of the Growing Pains series is to highlight the role that reliable solar resource data plays in ensuring the success of large-scale solar projects.

As solar farms become increasingly complex, de-risking bifacial projects by reducing the uncertainty around albedo will be crucial. We sat down with Vicente Lara-Fanego
PhD, Weather and Solar Modelling Expert, and Harsh Goenka, Business Development Manager, to discuss Solargis’ new two-part report on this little understood data source

Ten years ago, an average solar PV project was a relatively simple affair, comprising 10MW of fixed, monofacial modules. The market has moved on a long way since then. Now, typical solar farms approach 100MW in size and may use a range of technologies such as bifacial, intelligent tracking and floating modules, creating new possibilities for more efficient energy production.

Solar power’s star is rising resolutely, as lower costs of production open up new markets around the world and solar projects scale up, rapidly. In the last two decades, the size of solar installations has increased dramatically, and we are witnessing the rise of ‘megaprojects’.

Branislav Schnierer, PV Modeling Expert at Solargis, discusses the most common problems and best practices for taking and quality-controlling ground measurements. Webinar was recorded for PVPMC 2020 event in China.

Satellite maps are a basic tool for decision makers, planners and developers of photovoltaic (PV) power plants. They are essential for site-selection, land evaluation and understanding the local topography. They play an indispensable role, especially for the evaluation of sites in unknown territories and in peculiar climate zones.

Global Photovoltaic Power Potential by Country is an innovative new study developed by Solargis for the World Bank. The study aims to assess the potential for solar PV in every country, capitalising on several new, market-first, metrics and techniques.