Sandia study solar storms photovoltaic

Does severe weather affect solar farms?

Machine learning found farm age, cloud cover impact performance during a storm Sandia National Laboratories researchers combined large sets of real-world solar data and advanced machine learning to study the impacts of severe weather on U.S. solar farms, and sort out what factors affect energy generation.

How long has Sandia been doing photovoltaic R&D?

Sandia has been performing Photovoltaic R&D for over 40 years. In 1976, Sandia tested the performance and reliability of the first fielded terrestrial systems in the co-sponsored DOE-NASA-Jet Propulsion Laboratory Block Program.

Are hurricanes a threat to solar farms?

(Photo by Randy Montoya) Click on the thumbnail for a high-resolution image. Hurricanes, blizzards, hailstorms and wildfires all pose risks to solar farms both directly in the form of costly damage and indirectly in the form of blocked sunlight and reduced electricity output.

Are hailstorms a problem in solar farm maintenance records?

While hailstorms tend to be very costly, they did not appear in solar farm maintenance records, likely because operators tend to document hail damage in the form of insurance claims, Gunda said.

How do storms affect electricity production?

They used statistics to find that snowstorms had the highest effect on electricity production, followed by hurricanes and a general group of other storms. Then they used a machine learning algorithm to uncover the hidden factors that contributed to low performance from these severe weather events.

Why do solar farms have low wind speeds?

Surprisingly low wind speeds were significant. This is likely because when high wind speeds are predicted, solar farms are preemptively shut down so that the employees can evacuate leading to no production, Gunda said. Expanding the approach to wildfires, the grid