The PV DOCTORTM provides an advanced and comprehensive range of asset management services for photovoltaic (PV) system owners across Asia. The company had its “soft launch” in October 2024 and now provides services directly to industry customers. In just nine months, the team has on-boarded close to 100 MWp of PV assets across more than 300 sites in 8 countries (Singapore, Southeast Asia and India).
PV DOCTORTM is an Asset Performance Management (APM) company which aims to commercialise the know-how and services developed in the “Smart O&M” Group at SERIS. It also leverages the vast experiences with PV systems (design, implementation, operation, trouble-shooting, maintenance) which SERIS has gathered over the past 15 years in Singapore and the region.
The importance of monitoring of solar PV systems on a daily basis (and ideally in real time) cannot be overstated, given the number of PV assets that are underperforming in the world (a global assessment by a consulting company estimates annual losses of USD 4.6 billion worldwide). Poorly operating PV systems can also pose safety and/or fire risks, which must be mitigated.
The analogies with the medical world are striking (therefore the company name) and the graphic below provides an overview of the comprehensive “medical” services of the PV DOCTORTM.
Generally, the PV DOCTORTM has identified three types of PV assets, depending on their level of monitoring:
- “Abandoned” systems:
PV installations with no or little monitoring, sometimes even without any maintenance routines (which even poses safety and potentially fire risks). - Partially monitored systems:
Systems are checked for performance, however very infrequently (e.g. monthly or quarterly). This leads to non-optimum performance, as power trips or faults would only be detected with delays of weeks or even months.
- Fully monitored systems:
Typically belonging to professional developers or investors. In these cases the PV DOCTORTM is typically engaged for daily performance assessments, for which the in-house teams nor the maintenance contractors are not trained. Also, clients with “perfect” monitoring systems often require expert assistance to “make sense” out of the vast amount of data. This also to identify key learnings for future better optimised PV system designs.
The PV DOCTORTM team is ready to serve the needs of its clients.
Overview of the services offered by the PV DOCTOR spin-off for the asset management of PV systems. Image source: SD Global Tech.
The possible root causes of sub-optimal performance of PV systems include component defects, design-related issues, and issues arising from a poor installation. What is often underestimated are the severe financial impacts arising from underperforming PV assets.
a) Example 1: A collective under-performance of one quarter of the installed PV modules (only reaching 50% of the rated power); Using a 1 MWp rooftop example in Singapore, Figure 7(a) shows the impact of this module under-performance on the financial performance of the system and the energy output over its entire lifetime, as well as the positive impacts of rectification works.
