Satellite Vu receives funding to catalyse efficiency across commercial solar farms
Continuing our mission to address global challenges through the use of satellite technology, we’re proud to announce that we have received over £300K in funding to conduct industrial research for our SARM-PV project from The Energy Entrepreneurs Fund (EEF9).
The funding will be used to further develop our game-changing satellite-based infrared monitoring system, providing the commercial solar sector access to a thermal imaging Earth observation solution for the first time.
SARM-PV: Project Outline
Project SARM-PV will develop and test our high resolution infrared monitoring service to spot faults in commercial solar farms. By detecting and recognising temperature anomalies and alerting operators to potential problems within their infrastructure, we will be able to improve solar generation efficiency and reduce the costs and environmental impact associated with solar operations.
Whilst thermography from orbit is typically low-resolution, a combination of unique design features makes our system capable of producing thermal images at an unprecedented resolution, allowing solar farms to monitor and address their energy usage and the environmental impact of their output.
Economic and Environmental Benefits
We are aiming to increase the efficiency of the world’s 873GW solar PV generation fleet by 2% - 4%, boosting revenues and displacing electricity generated from fossil fuels. By 2050, Satellite Vu could help the solar PV industry to save 8.7MtCO2 in the UK and 95MtCO2 globally.
As a space-based solution, our service is unobtrusive, a low operational burden and significantly cheaper than current thermal inspection methods, providing commercial solar farm operators with regular, timely information on the condition of their generating fleet. Reducing the possibility of emerging faults going unnoticed for months under the current annual inspection model preferred by operators due to high-costs.
An earth observation approach also allows for georeferencing. Our system uses GIS-based AI that automatically registers the location of the asset and files the measurements accordingly; speeding up delivery by removing human processing from the record-analyse-display loop.
Additionally, improving the UK’s solar infrastructure will boost the UK’s energy resilience in light of the government’s Net Zero ambitions, the volatility of the fossil fuel energy market and disruption of imports due to geopolitical conflict, such as the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
The End Result
By alerting operators to potential problems within their infrastructure, Satellite Vu will catalyse efficiency in solar generation, boosting revenues and displacing fossil fuel generation.
Project SARM-PV is a big step towards more efficient, cost-effective, environmentally friendly thermal imaging service for the industry. The funding from The Energy Entrepreneurs Fund will help us achieve our aims at a faster pace, benefiting businesses, consumers and our environment through technological innovation within the commercial solar farm space.