An IoT open source platform for photovoltaic plants supervision

In the present work, the authors propose an IoT solution for photovoltaic plants monitoring based entirely on Open Source software. The described solution is implemented and deployed in a real plant of approximately 3 MW with a total number of 24 inverters and 156 string boxes. All details about software and hardware architecture are provided, proving that it is possible to develop a flexible, versatile and competitive monitoring system just using available Open Source tools. In addition, the authors make a detailed comparison between the proposed IoT solution and conventional SCADA-based monitoring systems, describing all benefits and drawbacks of conventional SCADAs and modern IoT systems and proposing solutions in order to overcome the identified weak points of the newest IoT-based monitoring systems.

Automated summary

In this work, the authors introduce an IoT solution for monitoring photovoltaic plants using open source software. The solution is implemented in a real plant and compared in detail with conventional SCADA-based monitoring systems. The study highlights the benefits and drawbacks of both systems and proposes solutions to address the weaknesses of IoT-based monitoring systems.