Patent ID: 9584064
Date: 2017-02-28
CPC Classifications: A46B,F24S,H02S,Y02E

Claim:
1. A method of cleaning photovoltaic panels in a solar energy system, the method comprising: receiving pyranometer measurements relating to weather conditions at a photovoltaic panel; receiving measurements relating to output current and voltage at the photovoltaic panel; determining expected power of the photovoltaic panel based on the measurements relating to weather conditions; determining actual power of the photovoltaic panel based on the measurements relating to output current and voltage; in response to determining that the actual power is not within a predetermined range of the expected power, initiating a cleaning of the photovoltaic panel; and updating a data log with a location of the cleaning, a time stamp of the cleaning and a number of cleaning cycles, wherein if the number of cleaning cycles exceeds a threshold limit comprising a number of cleaning cycles within a time period, updating the data log to recommend a manual inspection of the photovoltaic panel.