Multiple activities are carried out at the Innovation Lab. Some projects, performed both with laboratory testing and testing in real plants, are related the following topics: Testing of PV panels for the optimised selection of technologies for EGP plants Design optimization for plants with bifacial panels Testing and evaluation of automatic systems for the cleaning of PV panels Testing of robots for automatic assembly of PV panels in plants Testing of distributed electronics solutions for the optimization of plant performance Automatic drones for monitoring plants during construction and operation Predictive maintenance of plants with Big Data Analytics techniques Identification of plant anomalies through automatic processing of thermographic imaging Forecasting and nowcasting techniques for the prediction of plant anomalies Testing of smart solutions and of augmented reality to improve the safety and operation of plants Testing of hybrid and concentrated systems, and solutions for floating photovoltaic Projects and collaborations are developed through partnerships with small and large companies. The start-ups and SMEs we collaborate with in various areas include: Crel, Wylton, Ultrasolar, Fly-By, Archon, Apis, i-EM, M2D, Solergy, Snapback. These projects are developed following the process model from EGP’s Innovation division, which calls for the creation of a business case with three key elements for every technological solution: the goal of improving the Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) of plants; testing of the solution on a small- and medium-scale; development of the solution on a large-scale, pending positive results in the experimentation phase. We also have a collaboration with the nearby factory for 3SUN photovoltaic panels, which EGP founded and owns. The Innovation Lab offers support to the research and development activities of 3SUN through testing at the Catania laboratories, aimed at constant improvement of technologies and products.
