Tag Archives: solar

PV Monitoring

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PV installations are usually installed at remote areas, requiring maintenance teams to spend vast amounts of time to travel to the site. Furthermore, if the cause of problem could not be identified during the first visit or if the personnel did not bring the right spare parts or tools, another trip would be needed. This can be extremely time consuming, causing loss of productivity.

With Phoenix Contact’s PV monitoring system, this can help to minimise the downtime as we are able to monitor the PV plant in real time and obtain comprehensive data. Examples of equipment and readings that can be monitored are: inverters, energy meters, weather condition and even down to every string of the PV panel. If there is any anomaly, an alarm notification would be send to personnel via SMS or email. This is made possible by incorporating a 3G/4G router which can also allow access to the system from other parts of the world.

Samples of data tables

Another reading which has been requested by many owners of solar plants is historical trends with regards to the efficiency of their plant. To store such a large amount of data at the local controller is not a good idea, furthermore security and performance issues which would possibly affect the local controller could arise.  By having the data pushed to cloud storage, it is possible to send the entire plant’s data into the cloud. From the cloud’s database, the data can then be re-organised into trends for further analysis.  The historical trends are useful for optimising the productivity of the solar energy plant. For example, we could see the amount of energy generated with respect to the weather condition. From these sets of data, we will be able to tell if the PV Panel is generating the expected energy output. Any anomalies in the respective PV Panels can then be identified immediately.  With the implementation of such data, the inefficiency of the solar plant would be minimised.

Samples of trend data

Interested to find out more? Feel free to contact us at marketing@phoenixcontact.com.sg!

Solar String Combiner Box Selection Criteria

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“I would like to have a quotation for a solar string combiner box. Please give me the quote ASAP.”

Two of the many possible options

This is the request that we always receive from customers when they want our proposal on solar string combiner boxes (SCB). Unfortunately, we will not be able to offer anything with such a brief statement like this. With that being said, we would like to take this chance to explain to the customers what information is required in order to help us to propose the right SCB for you.

  1. Maximum open-circuit voltage (Voc)
    First, we need to know the maximum open-circuit voltage (Voc) of your solar system design, whether it is 600 / 1000 / 1500V DC. The most common Voc in the market now is 1000V DC and we are also moving towards 1500V DC in Malaysia. This Voc is totally dependent on the system design.
  2. Maximum short-circuit current per string
    So where can we find this info? We are able to know what is our maximum short-circuit current by identifying the short-circuit current of the individual solar module that you have selected, and then multiplying it with the maximum short-circuit current multiplier. Every country has their own specific requirement for the maximum short-circuit multiplier; it can be 1.25 or 1.5 and etc.
  3. Input and Output
    Input here is referring to the number of solar strings going into the SCB and output is referring to the number of MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracker) involved. You will be able to find the info on the number of MPPT from the inverter that you are using in your system. Once this is confirmed, we will know the configuration you need for your SCB.
  4. Fuse holder Polarity
    We need to also find out from the customer whether they would like to have fuse holder at positive polarity only or at both positive and negative polarity. From protection point of view, we encourage our customers to have fuse holder at both positive and negative polarity because this will give higher protection to the SCB on the incoming side. However, it is still fine to have fuse holder at only positive polarity to fulfil the local standard requirement.
  5. String termination at SCB
    Sunclix Connector

    Sunclix Connector

    Phoenix Contact SCB always comes with Sunclix plug-in connectors instead of normal cable glands. This is because our Sunclix connectors make string cable installations fast and efficient. No additional tools are required to connect our Sunclix connectors. Our SCB are customizable, if the customers are more comfortable with cable glands, we can always revert back to using them.

  6. Monitoring features
    Our SCB is able to monitor both voltage and string current if these are required using our Solarcheck modules, which uses Hall’s effect.

Other than the above, our SCB comes with many other great features that will help you in your solar PV system. If you are interested in our solar string combiner boxes, please feel free to contact us at marketing@phoenixcontact.com.sg!

Importance of Safety in PV Components & Practical Solutions for Solar Systems

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PV_solar_seminar_MY

Key takeaways:

1. New development of water-proofed solar cable was introduced and production expected to commence by year end at Lapp Korea plant.

2. Understanding how surge protection works in solar system help to eliminate unnecessary assets damages and losses.

3. New string combiner boxes with excellent design and quality were introduced and ready to penetrate into solar market.

4. Phoenix Contact DC string monitoring solution is flexible and easy to deploy. Continue reading →