Advances in AI will lead to a “paradigm shift” in solar asset management, with a range of complex analytics and plant performance processes becoming as simple as talking to a chatbot.
That is the prediction of Govinda Upadhyay, the CEO of Switzerland-based SmartHelio, which offers a range of AI-based PV plant performance tools.
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In an interview with PV Tech Premium, published today, Upadhyay shared details of a new large language model his company is building called ‘Solar GPT’, an AI agent able to perform a range of tasks through simple user prompts, much like generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT.
“We want to build technology to create a paradigm shift in the way we look at renewables,” Upadhyay said.
By linking to SmartHelio’s databases, which contain huge amounts of operational data on PV power plants, Upadhyay said Solar GPT can provide detailed analytics reports and even plant repowering strategies for developers looking to maximise the performance of their assets.
“These answers would have taken months to get for a 100MW plant,” Upadhyay said.
Upadhyay said AI technology would do away with the need for the usual digital interfaces and software platforms typically used for PV power plant management.
“I do believe in a world where we don’t need dashboards, we don’t need so much software,” he said. “It’s only one chatbot; we just talk to the AI agent.”
To read the interview in full, click here (subscription required).
