A tool to define the position and the number of irradiance sensors in large PV plants

Monitoring irradiance values is a critical issue for correct management and possible fault detection in large photovoltaic plants. In a previous work it was shown that the use of suitable spatial interpolation algorithms allows better accuracy in the estimation of the irradiance values, especially under partial shading conditions. At the same time, the number of irradiance sensors should be limited, for obvious economic reasons. In this paper a procedure is proposed to define the optimal placement of a fixed number of irradiance sensors and an analysis is performed to investigate the impact of the number of installed sensors on the quality of the estimated irradiance map. The proposed study is aimed to be a tool that supports the plant operator in the design of the most appropriate measurement infrastructure.