Cloud Service Promises Unparalleled PV Performance Tracking

Intense competition has driven the costs of manufacturing solar photovoltaic (PV) cells and modules down sharply in just a few short years. That's led downstream solar industry participants to focus on reducing solar's 'soft' and balance-of-system costs. Some innovative solar energy sector participants see great promise in eking out and amassing small gains in efficiency -- gains that can that collectively make a big difference to commercial and utility-scale PV system operators, as well as consumers.

Locus Energy, the developer of an enterprise-class, cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that's said to provide operators unprecedented data collection, analytics and reporting capabilities, is offering just such a solution. On Oct. 22, Locus announced that Swinerton Renewable Energy will make use of its SolarNOC and PVIQ analytics suite to optimize the management of its portfolio of solar PV assets.

Leveraging public and proprietary data sets gleaned from satellites and on-site sensors, Locus is able to provide its users actionable data on the performance of PV systems at a much greater level of geographic resolution and analytic detail than has ever been possible -- remotely or on-site. That, in turn, enables the company to identify and account for the factors that lead to divergences in forecast and actual performance of solar PV systems -- whether distributed, commercial or of utility-scale -- and take action to remedy them, Adrian De Luca, Locus Energy's vice president of sales and marketing, explained to 3p in an interview.

Enhancing the performance of PV assets

The enhanced PV asset monitoring, data collection and analytics Locus's SolarNOC and PVIQ provides can make a big difference when it comes to optimizing the performance of PV systems, De Luca told 3p.

In addition to providing solar PV system managers more powerful monitoring, data gathering and analytic capabilities, one of PVIQ's three modules enables them to automate performance reporting to meet the needs of all participants involved in any given solar PV power generation system. That includes banks, investors and insurers, as well as equity investors and operations and maintenance providers.

Locus Energy's PVIQ incorporates data gathered from approximately 50,000 solar PV monitoring systems across North America. As an independent developer and vendor of a Web-based solar analytics platform, Locus has been able to amass the most extensive and comprehensive database relevant to monitoring and evaluation of PV systems' performance in North America, De Luca told 3p.

Leveraging "Big Data" analytics

In addition to solar irradiation levels, the Locus platform's solar PV monitoring capabilities provide current data on a range of pertinent weather and atmospheric condition metrics, such as cloud cover, at much greater resolution than can be obtained from NOAA and NASA data sets, or those of competitors, De Luca continued. Similarly, Locus Energy is working to expand the range of the historical data sets included in its cloud-based platform and application offerings.

That has given Locus the edge needed to acquire a large and diverse set of customers that include solar PV equipment manufacturers, as well as solar farm owners, operators and investors, he added. Along with its large customer base, Locus Energy's cloud-based, SaaS delivery model affords the Hoboken, New Jersey-based company the ability to compete on price, as well as the range and quality of the products and services it offers.

Locus's PVIQ consists of three elements:

• Virtual Irradiance (VI);


• the Waterfall performance report; and


• a spreadsheet program plug-in.

As Locus explains, "VI uses satellite and weather data to provide highly accurate ground-level irradiance data in 15-minute increments with coverage across the contiguous U.S." The Waterfall performance report, in turn, "assesses the drivers behind under-performance, including factors such as inverter malfunction, shading and soiling."

PVIQ's third element is plug-in software that allows operators to access the Locus database directly from an Excel spreadsheet. That, the company explains, "dramatically reduces the time required to prepare periodic performance reports.

Managing solar PV asset fleets

All of these elements and attributes, as well as being cloud-based and delivered as SaaS, contributed to Swinerton Renewable Energy's decision to make use of Locus Energy's SolarNOC and PVIQ suite to manage its entire fleet of PV assets.

“Locus is uniquely positioned to provide the most advanced monitoring and analytics solutions across all segments of the PV market, at scale,” Angelo Purpuras, Swinerton's manager of technical services, was quoted as saying. “The use of the SolarNOC to manage our fleet provides our technicians with unprecedented data visibility, and the PVIQ analytics will help us to continue providing premium O&M services to our customers.”

San Francisco-based Swinerton's PV portfolio encompasses more than 400 megawatts of rated renewable power generation capacity. Another 600 MW is now under construction.

"Swinerton will use Locus's SolarNOC and PVIQ in tandem with its own SOLV solution to provide best-in-class monitoring, analytics, and O&M (operations and maintenance) services for both its utility-scale and commercial fleet customers," the two companies explain in a press release.

"By leveraging Locus Energy’s web-based SolarNOC software as part of the SOLV solution, Swinerton’s fleet operators will be able to more efficiently organize and assess performance data over a diverse set of solar PV assets spread across a wide geographical area, as well as streamline O&M workflows," the companies elaborated.

"In addition, Locus Energy has expanded its data acquisition and presentation capabilities, enabling Swinerton to integrate data from its industry-leading SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) system."

*All images courtesy Locus Energy