Fault detection and monitoring systems for photovoltaic installations: A review

As any energy production system, photovoltaic (PV) installations have to be monitored to enhance system performances and to early detect failures for more reliability. There are several photovoltaic monitoring strategies based on the output of the plant and its nature. Monitoring can be performed locally on site or remotely. It measures production, focuses also on verification and follow-up of converter and communication devices' effective operation. Up to now, some faults diagnosis methods for PV components and systems have been developed. However, given the evolution of PV installations, more advanced monitoring techniques are continuously under investigation. In this paper, major photovoltaic system failures are addressed. Then techniques for photovoltaic monitoring proposed in recent literature are overviewed and analyzed to point out their differences, advantages and limits.