Fracsun announced that it has partnered with App Orchid to develop the solar industry’s first soiling loss database and simulation tool powered by AI.
Soiling loss globally costs 3 to 5 billion dollars of lost revenue every year according to the IEA-PVPS. Fracsun’s soiling stations empower solar operators to clean on a financially optimized schedule, only doing so when absolutely necessary. Measuring soiling loss was something that evaded the solar industry for years. Fracsun’s soiling station enabled both quantifying this loss value while launching a global database for the solar industry. The Fracsun database is now collecting data on over 7GW of solar assets in 22 countries. Utilizing this data in the planning stages of a project will enable more accurate production modeling and O&M budget planning, removing a major component of uncertainty in project bankability. The new product will enable users to predict soiling loss with a simple query to the database that leverages App Orchid’s AI platform.
As site conditions change due to localized weather and the climate in general, it is critically important to understand how this loss is evolving and how to utilize a tool that constantly learns and predicts to better deploy solar assets globally.
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The Fracsun & App Orchid Partnership
Utilizing the Fracsun soiling loss database integrated with AO’s Knowledge Graphs and Data Fabric to incorporate historical weather patterns, particulate matter and other sources of relevant data, all in conjunction with the powerful App Orchid AI platform, the team is building a probabilistic modeling and decision engine that can predict soiling loss at any location in the US.
Project Developers will find this tool useful when running production reports to determine a modeled plant’s expected soiling loss. Eliminating this unknown upfront in the development phase will ensure projects hit production targets.
O&M teams will utilize Fracsun’s new AI tool to better understand operating costs, improve scheduling with vendors to minimize unforeseen conflicts and to generate optimized cleaning schedules.
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Origination teams can even use this new product to understand regions that are best suited for development with minimal impacts due to soiling loss.
“Developers and operational professionals alike are often asking for better insight into future costs and production impacts due to soiling for their assets. This ultimately led us on the journey to find an AI solution that can utilize our data and predict how any plant will perform across the globe. App Orchid’s decision engine is the perfect fit for this integration.
“This unforeseen impact to project performance has been a source of pain for years and only looks to be getting worse looking to the future.”, said Catlin Mattheis, CEO of Fracsun.
“Timely AI-powered decision intelligence can drastically improve operational efficiency,” said Vaibhav Nadgauda, CEO of App Orchid. “Our collaboration with Fracsun proves how the predictive analytics and decision-making AI built on App Orchid’s platform can enable the solar industry to be more sustainable while improving profitability.”
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