Design and analysis of an autonomous cleaning robot for large scale solar PV farms

Abstract

In this era of depleting natural resources, renewable energy resources like solar power must be captured effectively to meet future power needs. As far India is considered, the installed electrical power capacity is 329.20 GW. Out of this, only 12.28 GW is supplied by solar power plants. One of the main reasons for the poor output from solar farms is the dust deposition on solar panels. Different observations of the effect of dust and other particles on solar panels states that the efficiency of solar farms will reduce drastically. To get the maximum output from solar panels, frequent cleaning is necessary. This work focuses on the design, development and analysis of portable solar panel cleaning equipment which can be installed in any kind of solar Photovoltaic (PV) farm.