Transparency and Better Forecasting Tools Needed for the Solar Industry

Jennifer Runyon, Managing Editor, RenewableEnergyWorld.com
December 12, 2012 | 10 Comments

According to speakers at a Renewable Energy World Conference session on Successful Solar Development, developers and financiers of solar projects would benefit from greater transparency into manufacturing lines. In addition, as utilities add increasing amounts of solar power into their power mixes, independent system operators will need more sophisticated tools to accurately forecast how much solar power their systems will be able to use at any given moment.

Jenya Meydbray, CEO of PV Evolution Labs explained that as manufacturers have become squeezed with falling prices and reduced demand, many are looking to reduce production costs, which may lead to cutting corners, he said. PV Evolution Labs, in partnership with SolarBuyer is proposing that the industry adopt an Approved Vendor Standard, which would perform factory audits and module testing. Meydbray said this is common practice in more mature industry like semiconductors and traditional power generation.

According to Meydbray, his company started performing independent testing on modules in 2010 and in 2011 SolarBuyer started independently auditing solar factories and doing pre-shipment inspections of large-quantities of new modules. Their results showed that out of more than 40 mainstream module manufacturers only 6 (15%) manufacturers delivered consistently good quality product.

Another speaker on the panel discussed the importance of solar energy modeling for Independent System Operators (ISOs). Marie Schnitzer of AWS Truepower explained that as larger PV farms come online, short-term ramp events will have a bigger impact. A ramp event occurs when a solar array suddenly stops producing power due to cloud cover or shading. It could also occur when that cloud cover lifts and the array ramps back up again.

According to Schnitzer, it will become increasingly important for ISOs to be able to determine exactly how much power an array will be providing the next hour. The solution to this challenge again, highlights the difficulties that emerging industries face because Schnitzer said it might take five more years of data collection in order to have good reliable modeling. She said that now energy modeling relies on black and white satellite imagery, which means that sometimes it is challenging to determine if, for example, a darker area in a desert region is a dry lake bed or a cloud.

What’s clear is that solar power is growing at incredible rates. All four of the keynote speakers at Power-Gen International mentioned solar power as one of the mega-trends they were watching.

The Successful Solar Development session was part of the Renewable Energy World Conference and Expo, North America, taking place now in Orlando, Florida. The show is co-located with Power-Gen International, the largest show for the power generation industry in the world. This year, the combined shows have welcomed a record number of registered attendees at 21,000 plus visitors.

Lead image: Solar Array in New Mexico via Shuttersock

10 Comments

Gary McCallum
December 16, 2012

Dave fisher have a look at the Orion Solartech.com solar energy systtem. It is a PV thermal structural solar roof that can use stored hot water to clear the snow off.

Are you thinking of using seperate imbeded wires in a PV system for resistance or the wires used for carying current and if so would they be able to take enough current to allow for the resistance to create heat

william payne
December 15, 2012

Study of solar battery charging which works, on small-scale, compels us to study battery charging.

http://www.prosefights.org/battery/battery.htm

Large-scale too. Like EVs. :)

william payne
December 13, 2012

Hey hall-robert-343772 I am working on a response to brian-wark-173069.

'The power density of AM1.5 light is about 1,000W/m2; the power density of AM0 light is about 1,360W/m2, which is considered to be the solar constant.'

:)

Rob Andrews
December 13, 2012

A very interesting article. With the growth of the physical capital as we see in this solar installation "boom", we need a matching increase in the knowledge capital related to how to install, design, and maintain these systems.

As was mentioned by AWS in this article, the accumulation of the data needed to truly understand the complex operation of these systems can take many years and be prohibitively expensive for a single company to undertake. On the flip side of this, many solar operators have more data than they know what to do with, but do not have the mandate or motivation to utilize it, as the potential gains to the operator are seen as "marginal" (at this stage in the solar game).

As an example to this, in Kingston, Ontario we see significant amounts of snowfall, which can have a noticeable effect on PV performance. In order to model this effect, large amounts of data must be collected and analyzed. Because the effect can be considered "marginal", industry players were not able to take on this analysis. In response to this, 18 Industry partners in the Ontario region came together and helped to fund the OSOTF (Open Solar Outdoors Test Field) in Kingston, Ontario (http://www.appropedia.org/Open_Solar_Outdoors_Test_Field), and by pooling resources we were able to perform an in-depth study on snowfall losses which will be released in an upcoming publication. This data allows for less financial insecurity in project financing, and better optimizations of designs.

This is a small example of how industry transparency and collaboration can be a good financial decision for all parties involved, and can help to move the industry forward.

ROBERT HALL
December 13, 2012

brian-wark your metric for PV array power per acre is off by a factor of ten. To accomodate for shading, etc. a better experienced-based metric is 120 -150 kW per acre.

brian wark
December 13, 2012

billp37 a 10 MW solar PV array takes up about 7 acres. no long term damage to land. That is 10,000,000 watts / 28,000 sq meters = 353 Watts / sq meter no water resources used. Germany has 30 GW's installed = 30,000 MW / 10 MW x 7 acres = 21,000 acres In Ontario, Canada we have 105,000 acres of golf courses As well most solar goes on un-used rooftop space. China figures they have 100 million sq ft of flat roof commercial. equal to 23 GW's. Solar produces power at 31 grams of CO2 over lifetime, nat gas 600 grams/ kwhr. Most studies are done by people that do not fully understand the technology.

KIMBERLY (KIM) KING
December 13, 2012

Interesting aside. After making my post here, I caught this read.

Corporate executive fears over energy, resources hit new high - http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/12/12/corporate-executive-fears-energy-resources-hit-new-high?page=full

I noticed the operatives 'investment', 'resiliency' ' adapting' were featured prominently in this offering.

KIMBERLY (KIM) KING
December 13, 2012

I find it a bit 'amusing' that (wo)man tries to outsmart Mother Nature. With the increase in climate instability events, perhaps, like lower-order creatures, we should be focusing more on adapting and more appropriate responses, instead of expecting her to acquiesce to our current quality of life needs expectations. I think, surely predicting and precisely modeling all this uncertainty will likely be increasing and more challenging in the years to come. I reiterate, I think practicing adaptability and response would be a more prudent and proactive approach.

william payne
December 13, 2012

The post

fast neutron
Santa Fe, NM
January 12, 2009

From actual experience, wind farms produce 1.2 watts per square meter. Solar Thermal and Photovoltaic methods capture 5 to 6 watts per square meter. There is no economy of size in either technology. Dividing the watts you need by those values gives the land area in square meters needed to produce the juice. The numbers are astronomical

http://www.topix.net/forum/source/santa-fe-new-mexican/T0QVJ5UD3R25C8HRL

caused

http://www.prosefights.org/solarlight/solarlight.htm#runyon

Yotam Ariel
December 13, 2012

Interesting. Thanks.

Transparency means giving power to consumers.

This is only embraced by very confident businesses who take the attitude of a level playing field where winners are those who offer the best value for the consumer, and not those with the best marketing smoke tricks.

We are helping with transparency through this verification sticker and feedback system:
http://luminanet.org/profiles/blogs/let-s-listen-to-the-villager-bennuvalue-verification-stickers-and

I'll gladly share my knowledge.

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Jennifer Runyon

Jennifer Runyon is managing editor of RenewableEnergyWorld.com coordinating, writing and/or editing columns, features, news stories and blogs for the publications. She also serves as conference chair of Solar Power-Gen Conference and Exhibition...