ClearSolar

Project title: CLEAR SOLAR Source of funding: Aid for the support of Innovative Business Groups (AEI) from the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism (MINCOTUR) File identification number: AEI-010500-2022b-180 Project beneficiary: Solartys Project consortium: Solartys, Instituto de Sistemas Fotovoltaicos de Concentración S.A. (ISFOC), Blue Circular Innovation (Blue Room Innovation Group), and Sterna Innovation. Project duration: 2022-2023 Execution budget: €145,203.40

DESCRIPTION: ISFOC participates in the CLEAR SOLAR project, whose main objective is to design and develop a new tool that allows the photovoltaic solar energy production sector to accurately know the health status of solar installations and plan the necessary maintenance actions to optimize and maximize the efficiency and production level of the country's photovoltaic plants. The project focuses on solving the problem of dirt accumulation on solar panels, an issue that can affect their performance by up to 20% and for which, to date, there is no technological solution aimed at controlling and minimizing its effects. The tool created by the project will benefit the entire value chain of the photovoltaic solar sector in the future, including producers, installation companies, and other sector members.

To achieve this objective, the project aims to cover the following specific goals:

• Design and validation of a new sensor for photovoltaic installations that allows precise monitoring of their maintenance status through the measurement of the amount of dirt accumulated on the surface of the modules. The collected data will be sent to the cloud in real-time using IoT communication network technology.

• Development of a predictive algorithm using artificial intelligence techniques, which will estimate the expected production for a self-consumption installation, and the creation of a low-cost weather station prototype to collect and send real weather information to the central server from the locations where the developed dirt sensors are deployed.

• Creation of a collaborative cloud platform that serves to visualize and consult the status of a solar installation, collect estimated production information, and connect agents (especially small producers and installers) in the photovoltaic solar energy sector.

The CLEAR SOLAR project is part of the call for Aid for the Support of Innovative Business Groups (AEI) from the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism (MINCOTUR), as well as the 2021 call within the framework of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. The main objective of these aids is to strengthen business groups and improve the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises.

The CLEAR SOLAR project is subsidised by the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism (MINCOTUR).