Virtuous-Re’s new PVradar Cleaning App can reportedly model fouling losses and cleaning benefits, while reducing cleaning costs and maximizing the overall financial performance of projects.
“PVradar has been developed by a group of photovoltaic engineers and software engineers with many years of experience in soiling and cleaning optimization,” CEO Thore Müller said. pv magazine. “PVradar is the software we hope to have in our previous work.”
Developers can reportedly import detailed plans or perform quick checks based on high-level descriptions of the facility. It is possible to modify the application’s settings later. The next step is to assess the plant’s environmental conditions.
“So that teams don’t have to analyze and format data from different sources, PVradar supports the automatic import of dirt, rain and radiation data from public databases,” explained Müller. “If pollution measurements are not available, pollution is estimated from satellite measurements of airborne particles and 20 years of historical rainfall.”
The third step is the selection of cleaning systems and operating models. Each cleaning system is described with a set of technical parameters.
“The model includes lifetimes for each system and sub-components such as brushes, tanks and batteries,” said Müller.
Users of the application can also choose different operating models for each cleaning technology.
“With this, the user has already completed his task. The software now takes over and optimizes the optimal cleaning strategy for each selected option,” said Müller. “Based on the last 20 years of data, the algorithm first simulates the dirtiness that the plant would have experienced if it had only been cleaned by rain. Then, and each year separately, it finds the optimal cleaning schedule that maximizes additional revenue after additional costs.”
Virtuous-Re said it plans to eventually expand its approach to other technologies such as bifacial modules, albedo enhancers and battery storage.
