Publicação
Validation of production estimates of operating photovoltaic parks
| Resumo: | During the pre-construction phase of a photovoltaic park (PV), it is essential to obtain accurate estimates of energy production, which depend on both the solar resource and the technical characteristics of the various components of the system. Inaccurate estimates can compromise project planning and feasibility. This study evaluated MEGAJOULE’s estimation procedure, which uses PVsyst simulations and defines uncertainty ranges associated with both the solar resource and the photovoltaic system. The comparison between real data from 11 PV parks in Spain over their first four years of operation allowed for validation of the method and confirmation of the reliability of the estimates. Two main studies were conducted, involving two different PVsyst simulations for each park. The first assessed the performance of the estimates compared to actual production values, while the second analysed the influence of the type of database used. In the first study, the estimates were compared to real production values using MEGAJOULE’s standard database— a typical meteorological year (TMY) from Solargis incorporated into the simulations. The results were found to be in close agreement with the real data, with only six out of 44 analysed years falling outside the uncertainty limits, demonstrating a strong alignment between estimated and actual performance. Furthermore, it was found that the maximum deviation observed in a single park relative to the overall average was approximately 5.9%, confirming the consistency and reliability of the estimates. In the second study, the TMY was replaced with databases containing the actual climatic data for each operational year. The analysis did not reveal any clear trend resulting from this change, confirming that the TMY, as applied in the company’s methodology, provides sufficient accuracy and that the impact of using real-year data is minimal. The main results of this work therefore confirm the validation of MEGAJOULE’s methodology for estimating energy production in photovoltaic parks. |
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| Autores principais: | Barbosa, Eduardo Filipe Miranda |
| Assunto: | Photovoltaic park Energy estimate Uncertainty Pvsyst Validation Parque fotovoltaico Estimativa de produção Incerteza Validação Engenharia e Tecnologia::Engenharia Mecânica |
| Ano: | 2025 |
| País: | Portugal |
| Tipo de documento: | dissertação de mestrado |
| Tipo de acesso: | acesso aberto |
| Instituição associada: | Universidade do Minho |
| Idioma: | inglês |
| Origem: | RepositóriUM - Universidade do Minho |
| Resumo: | During the pre-construction phase of a photovoltaic park (PV), it is essential to obtain accurate estimates of energy production, which depend on both the solar resource and the technical characteristics of the various components of the system. Inaccurate estimates can compromise project planning and feasibility. This study evaluated MEGAJOULE’s estimation procedure, which uses PVsyst simulations and defines uncertainty ranges associated with both the solar resource and the photovoltaic system. The comparison between real data from 11 PV parks in Spain over their first four years of operation allowed for validation of the method and confirmation of the reliability of the estimates. Two main studies were conducted, involving two different PVsyst simulations for each park. The first assessed the performance of the estimates compared to actual production values, while the second analysed the influence of the type of database used. In the first study, the estimates were compared to real production values using MEGAJOULE’s standard database— a typical meteorological year (TMY) from Solargis incorporated into the simulations. The results were found to be in close agreement with the real data, with only six out of 44 analysed years falling outside the uncertainty limits, demonstrating a strong alignment between estimated and actual performance. Furthermore, it was found that the maximum deviation observed in a single park relative to the overall average was approximately 5.9%, confirming the consistency and reliability of the estimates. In the second study, the TMY was replaced with databases containing the actual climatic data for each operational year. The analysis did not reveal any clear trend resulting from this change, confirming that the TMY, as applied in the company’s methodology, provides sufficient accuracy and that the impact of using real-year data is minimal. The main results of this work therefore confirm the validation of MEGAJOULE’s methodology for estimating energy production in photovoltaic parks. |
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