How much energy are the projects generating and what is correlated to?

Replacing traditional energy with solar energy aims to increase the efficiency and sustainability of our energy. So, what factors could help us maximize the output of solar energy projects?

As we all know, the sun is the direct source of solar energy, which leads to our primary factor affecting solar system production. According to research, global horizontal irradiance (GHI) accounts for 71.6% of performance variations (Herman, 2016). Location determines GHI; for example, California, Arizona, Nevada are the ideal location for maximizing production. Although New York State is in the eastern area, and the sunlight is not as sufficient as in Nevada, other factors can also help to improve the system's performance, such as load on the inverter (Herman, 2016), which is how much direct current (DC) can be converted to alternating current (AC) for using electricity. Based on how a solar project functioning for a residential house, we explored two key factors: the number of inverters that convert DC to AC, and the number of PV (photovoltaic) modules that collect the sunlight and convert it into AC, and we used residential solar projects in 2015 as an example.

Source: https://www.utilitydive.com/news/the-3-factors-that-determine-solar-plant-performance/417134/

Inverter Quantity V.S. Expected KWh production

The relation between Inverter Quantity and Expected KWh production is highly dependent on the Primary Inverter. By looking at the overall before, we found that there is almost no correlation (0.11), however when plugging in the Primary Inverter Manufacturer, seems like this defines the ranges and slope of the trend. For example, the correlation for Enphase Energy between these two components is: 0.99

Take 2015 for example, 52% of projects installed only 1 inverter, and 25% of projects installed 2 inverter. Therefore, the most common inverter quantity for residential projects is 1 or 2 inverters. That is why most of the observations in the scatterplot are grouped in the left side. This as well is highly dependent on the Manufacturer. SMA America for example, the expected production ranges from 2000KWh to 12000KWh for a single inverter. However, 4 inverters do have higher production than 3 inverters. Whereas for Enphase Energy, the range for the same number of inverters in the project does not have a large variation. The maximum gap is around 1000 KWh, but more inverters installed in the project generate higher production.

Therefore, each Inverter's performance may impacted by other factors, like the load of inverter. As the load of each inverter varies from different types and manufacturers, expected KWh production for projects cannot simply be predicted by inverter quantity.

PV Quantity V.S. Expected KWh production

A Photovoltaic (PV) module is a device that collect sunlight and converts it into electricity. It is usually referring to multiple photovoltaic cells combined. In each project, there may be more than one module used to form a bigger array.

The correlation coefficient for photovoltaic V.S. expected KWh production is 0.96, meaning there PV module quantity is strongly and positively correlated to expected annual production. In this case, there are no need to look at the behavior by manufacturer or any other factor.

With more PV modules installed from the scatter plot, a project generates more output.

Also, 30 PV modules were the average quantity for a residential project in 2015. 65% of the projects installed PV modules between 20 to 40, so we can assume that 30 PV modules should sufficiently support regular residential use in New York State.

Therefore, if you consider installing a solar project for your house in New York State, one or two inverters are pretty much the quantity you would need, but check the manufacturer and its load efficiency. For PV module quantity, 20 would be the starting quantity to consider, and more PV module quantities mean larger output.

How do property owners are getting involved in solar power projects?

Breakdown of projects by purchase type

What is a solar power purchase agreement?

A solar power purchase agreement (PPA) is a financial agreement where a third party company designs, operates, and maintains the photovoltaic system, and an energy buyer agrees on the system installed on its property for exchange with usually a better energy price with zero to low cost to the energy buyer.

Source: https://www.seia.org/research-resources/solar-power-purchase-agreements

What is the difference between purchasing and leasing a photovoltaic system?

Purchasing means the property owner is taking responsibility for purchasing, installing, and maintaining the photovoltaic system. The property would usually connect to a general energy provider at the same time due to the lability of the system in respect of continuously generating power. In 2022, homeowners are paying between $17,538 and $23,458 after taking into account the federal solar tax credit. For residential purposes, the investment would usually payback in seven to eight years. (Click for more)

Similarly, leasing, as the name suggested, means leasing a photovoltaic system from a provider. Leasing the system eliminates the huge payment on the very first day, and replaces it with paying the provider a small amount each time period (depending on the contract). The property owner will be charged if the panel is damaged. Both purchasing and leasing would not usually benefit from getting better energy prices from energy providers.

For Residential purposes payback time is roughly presented as the right plot:

Source: https://news.energysage.com/residential-solar-panels-for-home/

The percentage of each solar power agreement type in New York State

There are a total of four solar power purchase agreement types: Purchase, Lease, Power Purchase Agreement, and Not available. Each Project must belong to one of the four categories. Not available indicate that the project does not require a power purchase agreement or the information is not available. To drill it though, we found the fact from the dataset that most all Not available are for Residential/Small Commercial programs.

From the donut chart, more property owners choose to purchase their own photovoltaic system. Compared with 46% of owners who purchased the system, 37% of property owners lease the system from third party along with only 12% of owners signed Power Purchase Agreement. 5% of the entire group base contain power purchase agreement type unknown. Here we consider it

Each county has its unique PPA type proportion, even though almost half of the owners decide to purchase the system. We dive deeper into the top six counties with the most projects.

Queens, Richmond and Orange are the three counties with a Leasing proportion greater or equal to 50%.
As a comparision, Suffolk and Nassau have Purchase proportion over 50%, where the proportion is only 37% across the state.
For Orange County, the Power Purchase Agreement proportion is 20%, remarkably beyond the 12% state proportion.

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