The renewable energy revolution is well underway. The Inflation Reduction Act is expected to drive an additional 95 GW of solar PV installations between 2023 and 2050 in the United States alone. That’s a great thing, right? 

Of course it is — but let’s discuss. 
 

The solar industry has an energy waste problem

There’s an underlying issue of waste that can’t go unchecked, and it stems from operational inefficiencies. If we maintain this pace of rapid expansion without making major changes to the way solar systems are operated, millions of kWh of energy will go to waste. Not a great statistic for a “sustainable” energy transition.

To achieve the energy transition quickly enough to meet global emissions reductions goals, we need a way to efficiently operate the additional systems that will come out of this explosion of growth at scale. 
 

Challenges of operating a rapidly expanding solar landscape 

Manual operations of solar PV systems isn’t scalable. A typical plant produces way too much data for any team of humans to realistically keep up with. Operators can detect and attend to major faults, but they often don’t have the time or resources necessary to detect the myriad of minor anomalies that add up to be quite a lot of energy over the course of a year. 

To keep systems running optimally — and prevent valuable renewable energy from going to waste — a support system is needed.
 

Shortage of skilled technicians 

The PV market is scaling exponentially, but the work force isn’t keeping up. As it stands today, the solar industry already faces a labor shortage. Skilled technicians in a correct location can be difficult to source. As new systems are created and added to the grid, this problem will become more pronounced. McKinsey forecasts that global solar will quadruple between 2021 and 2030, and with this growth, an additional 1.7 million workers will be required to operate and maintain these plants.

How will these plants be operated successfully if workers can’t be sourced? We must prepare for this problem now, before the wasted potential becomes unignorable.
 

Lack of transparency

One major problem in the way solar systems are operated today is the inability to get to the root cause of system downtime. Without detailed logs and transparency into items such as response and repair and spare parts and delivery times, it’s difficult to accurately attribute downtime to its true source.

And as the saying goes, you can’t manage what you don’t measure.
 

Growing underperformance issue

Operations of solar systems today is time, resource, and labor intensive. PV systems create a huge amount of data. And as solar assets grow in size and complexity, so too does the volume of data they produce. 

In most situations today, solar operators use a monitoring system to create a visualization of PV system data so it can be more easily analyzed. Engineers are then able to look for anomalies in the way PV systems are performing. It’s their job to detect system faults and determine how to remedy them. 

However, between resource constraints and ongoing pressure for reduced operations and maintenance (O&M) prices, engineers are simply unable to do a perfect job — and the problem is only getting worse.

The average solar system loses 8% of its possible energy production each year, and that loss is trending upward. That may sound like a small number, but over the course of a year it adds up to be quite a lot of energy lost. As an example, total solar capacity hit the Terawatt mark in 2022. That number is expected to double to 2.3 TW in 2025. Assuming an energy loss of 8%, that’s 184 GW of lost solar power — enough to power 32 million homes in the U.S.

The urgency of the moment simply cannot accept that amount of waste.

 

How autonomous operations can help

Unlike manually driven, human-dependent operations, autonomous operations is scalable. Instead of depending on overworked technicians sitting in control rooms, staring at screens and waiting for things to break, autonomous operations uses advanced AI and ML-driven algorithms to detect faults with 100% accuracy. The system then makes timely and correct decisions about what to do next to ensure solar systems run sustainably and efficiently.
 

Automated solar fault detection frees up time and resources

Autonomous operations frees up skilled engineers to do more value-add tasks — such as planning for and creating new solar projects, rather than sitting in a control room — a cost-factor activity. It also helps you to understand what’s going on behind the scenes at your plants, such as the impact spare parts and delivery times are having on your system performance. This way you’re able to optimise your spare parts stock for minimal downtime.
 

Rescue valuable renewable energy with raicoon AOC

raicoon autonomous operations center (AOC) detects measurable system faults with 100% accuracy without creating false alarms, greatly reducing response and repair times. In fact, autonomous operations will help you to rescue most of the 8% loss typical of the average solar plant.

If the issue of PV system underperformance isn’t addressed quickly, energy will continue going to waste. Solutions such as raicoon AOC are the only way we can sustainably operate the influx of additional solar systems necessary to meet global energy needs.

It’s either that, or allow millions of kWh of energy go to waste each year. If a truly sustainable energy transition is what the world is after, the right choice couldn’t be clearer.
Interested to learn more about how you can contribute to a fast, sustainable energy transition by rescuing renewable energy with autonomous operations? Contact our team today.