Software tool results for the performance analysis of an Agri-PV plant with high-efficiency bifacial modules

Electricity generation from renewable sources is definitely expected to grow in the next years, also thanks to a huge solar photovoltaic installed capacity, that will contribute to transform the energy mix and satisfy the established goals for the energy transition. In this framework, the idea of a traditional PV plant has evolved, combining the energy production and the safeguard of agricultural species and arable land: thus, an Agri-PV system is conceived. The goal of this thesis, developed in collaboration with the international energy company ENGIE, is to elaborate a software tool to identify the sources of losses and causes of underperformance of an Agri-PV utility-scale plant, located in Mazara del Vallo (Sicily, latitude of 37°47’37.70” N), owned by the Italian company ENGIE ENERGIES ITALIA S.r.l. With 66 MWp of installed rated power, this plant covers an area of 115 hectares and its official operation started on January 2023. It is equipped with more than 120,000 high-efficiency (21%) bifacial modules (rated power of 540 W) and a system of mono-axial solar trackers. Moreover, the Italian Transmission System Operator (TERNA) has imposed an injected power limit of 50 MW into the national grid. The study has been carried out on a set of data collected from May 2023 to August 2023. The basis of this work comes from a joint collaboration, where an optimized model has been developed to assess the performance for a single section of the plant, by taking as input ambient parameters like solar irradiance and ambient temperature. This thesis work extends the application of such a model to the whole array by developing a dedicated graphic user interface. Indeed, such tool will calculate the most important Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of the plant as the number of active strings, the energy production and the Performance Ratio (PR). In addition, as the disconnection of strings is a noticeable issue of this plant, the tool will permit to detect the active strings in the plant over a specific time interval.