PV monitoring system upgraded in record time
meteocontrol GmbH, a PV service provider headquartered in Augsburg, delivers plant owners and operators an efficient total package for the rapid, cost-efficient upgrade of the monitoring units in their PV systems. The company has provided proof of its expertise once again at the 3 MW solar park “Abuzaderas” operated by Tauber-Solar in southeastern Spain: it took just three-quarters of a day to replace the failure-prone monitoring solution at the park with the high-performance system made by meteocontrol. In light of the old system’s very unstable data communications and an increasing number of failures in the bus system, Tauber-Solar decided to retrofit the monitoring system used by the “Abuzaderas” PV system as quickly as possible and meteocontrol received the order.
Rapid tempo in Retrofitting
It took less than one day to complete the work at the Abuzaderas solar energy park. “One reason for our speed is definitely the modular and scalable technology we use in our products,” said Martin Schneider, Managing Director of meteocontrol. “We can integrate existing data loggers into the current IT environment without a lot of extra work and merge the data in the monitoring portal into a complete system again.” The new solution includes meteocontrol’s high-performance data loggers in conjunction with the company’s remote monitoring platform.
The monitoring system enables PV systems to be operated easily, reliably and cost-efficiently on a uniform Internet platform. Extensive analysis and alarm functions provide operators with a reliable tool that they can use to secure long-term earnings. The retrofit benefited from another plus as well: meteocontrol’s experts conducted the engineering for the project in advance at the company’s base in Augsburg and were able to provide the right accessories – such as the RS485 hub – on-site in Spain. “The experts from meteocontrol convinced us with their experience and their extensive, competent consulting,” said Martin Schmitt, Managing Director of the Tauber-Solar service center. “They ensured the fast, safe installation of a complete solution that is both economical and user-friendly.” Because integration into the meteocontrol system turned out to be so easy, Tauber-Solar is planning to carry out similar upgrades of other PV systems.
meteocontrol for any (worst-case) scenario
Demand is rising at meteocontrol among PV plant operators who want to retrofit their equipment with reliable monitoring systems. They have many reasons for seeking upgrades: their existing systems have failed to live up to requirements, were improperly installed, or are failure-prone owing to unstable data communications. “One real problem faced by technical operations management is a suboptimal monitoring system from a provider who has gone out of business,” Martin Schneider said. “In such cases, a fast upgrade is tremendously important – and our fixed-price package makes it financially manageable for customers, too.”
meteocontrol provides upgrading and retrofitting solutions that represent holistic solutions for monitoring, grid feed-in management and direct marketing. The company monitors about 41,000 PV systems around the world with a total output of 11 GWp, and is the international leader among independent providers of PV monitoring systems.
