In 2019, aerial thermography analytics saved the utility solar industry $200 million in lost revenue. Rhino Environmental offers utility, commercial and residential aerial thermography to provide solar customers with performance verification and risk mitigation. Our industry leading small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) provide high-resolution 2D and 3D data, neatly packaged into deliverables tailored to fit your specific needs.
We complete annual utility solar inspections more thoroughly and at a fraction of the cost using state-of-the-art, multi-sensor, autonomous flight aircraft. Data processing algorithms interpret RGB color model imagery and radiometric thermal imagery to pinpoint production issues down to individual module cells. Inspection results include geotagged anomaly details such as string outages, cracked or delaminated modules, module cell damage and missing modules.
High Resolution Forward Looking InfaRed (FLIR) sensors spot thermal anomalies before they become visible to the human eye. This early warning system allows technicians to perform preventative maintenance and reduce lost production.
Case Study #1: The Importance of Sub-Station Aerial Thermography
The manager of a 32MW solar farm located in the southwest United States expected a particularly hot summer. As added precaution, the manager opted to perform an aerial thermography survey of the sub-station. During inspection, a temperature anomaly was detected within the cooling components of a medium-voltage transformer. This sub-station transformer recently passed it’s oil inspection and there were no signs of visible damage to the unit. It was determined a faulty relief valve was causing intermittent overheating. If left undiscovered, the fault could have caused the transformer to explode.
Case Study #2: sUAS Aerial Thermography and Insurance Claims
A big box retail store in north Florida made the commitment to sustainable energy by installing a massive 1MW rooftop solar array. The system, comprised of thousands of individual solar modules, typically completed an annual inspection over the course of many weeks, using methods such as current (I) and voltage (V) measurement and computation; IV curve tracing. The retailer was able to significantly cut inspection time and costs by switching to sUAS aerial thermography for annual solar performance verification testing. During the first sUAS inspection, hundreds of small temperature anomalies were found within individual module cells. The retailer used geo-spatial data from the inspection to present concrete evidence of previously unknown hail damage to their insurance provider and remediate all production loss.
Rhino Environmental, LLC 