Open Source PhotoVoltaics Library for Systemic Investigations

Abstract

For the planning of photovoltaic power plants standard software tools are used. Most of these software tools use statistical solar data to determine the overall energy harvest of a photovoltaic plant over one year. The calculations rely on stationary location and ideal boundary conditions, e.g., constant ambient temperature. Even though, for example, shadowing may be considered by standard software, the investigation of untypical configurations and problems cannot be performed by such software, as most configurations cannot be changed by the user.