Operation and Maintenance Methods in Solar Power Plants

As in any power plant, a solar power plant in operation requires maintenance. Also, as the solar power plant becomes older, operation and maintenance (O&M) becomes more and more important for improving or keeping the performance of the plant. Another aspect to be taken into account is that usually the solar power plants are in remote locations with unreliable communication infrastructure [1]. Most of the remote monitoring systems need an Internet connection, and in the absence of a reliable connection, there could be problems of lack of data logging for long periods of time [6]. This makes it very difficult to diagnose and rectify problems in a timely manner. System O&M is a broad area and is the continuing focus of several industry/government/national laboratory working groups. These groups will better define the issues and develop consensus O&M approaches over the next few years. This chapter reviews the main principles of solar generation from a perspective of O&M of these plants.