Fault Diagnosis On Photovoltaic Modules By Thermographic Analysis With Drone Support

Abstract

As part of the energy transition needed to combat climate change, photovoltaic systems are taking on an increasingly important role, with a considerable rise in the number of systems installed. This makes it necessary to find quick and reliable ways of performing inspections aimed at ensuring their proper operation, with the highest possible level of production. The amount of electricity that such plants manage to provide can, in fact, decrease due to simple shading, for the presence of deposits and debris on the modules, or, in the worst case scenario, due to a fault. The techniques used to carry out monitoring and surveying the operating status of a plant can be different. The most commonly used methods are visual inspection, I-V characteristic survey, and thermographic inspection. The latter, when carried out with the help of drones, allows inspections to be realized in a very short time and is the subject of study in this paper, in which an inspection carried out at a 999 kWp photovoltaic plant installed in Sicily and the use of the PSO algorithm to identify the optimal position of the drone are described.