A Low-Cost and Energy-Efficient Smart Dust Cleaning Technique for Solar Panel System

Dust accumulation or soiling is a major challenge faced by the solar farm which are in the desert areas where the solar resource is available in plenty. Dust can be classified as any particles on the panels which blocks the sun’s irradiance from reaching the solar cell. Soling is more prominent in solar farm which are placed in non-arid environment (Desert Regions). The performance of the Photovoltaic Systems is greatly affected by dust accumulation or soiling. Current methods used in the markets are costly, labour based, involves periodic battery replacement, more water usage, immense mechanical components and requires cyclic maintenance. This paper presents a low cost, energy efficient, smart dust cleaning technology for PV Panels, which shall mitigate the local climatic challenges in solar farm. The cleaning system is designed, automated using Programmable Logic Controller (ILC 131 ETH) which controls the devices used in the cleaning system and tested successfully. Particularly, the proposed solar cleaning system is expected to enhance the system efficiency of the Solar panels in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries which have climatic conditions of dusty weather conditions.