Here is a list of 20 innovative startups and companies applying AI to the solar industry that are making a positive impact on society.

The Omdena “Impact Tech Leaders Series” comprises game-changing startups, stories, and thought-leadership pieces from leading impact ventures solving real-world problems.

Introduction

Startups are constantly developing innovative ways to make new technologies accessible to the public. One of the biggest trends in technological advancement for society and the planet is to apply machine learning, or artificial intelligence (AI) in the renewable energy sector, including the solar industry. 

Companies like Smarthelio, Glint Solar, and Suncast are part of turning the solar industry into one of the fastest growing around the world, and innovative startups are looking to replicate that success by applying AI to make solar panels more efficient and inexpensive, allowing them to go mainstream and bring clean energy to millions of homes across the world.

How will artificial intelligence revolutionize the solar energy industry?

AI will change the solar industry in many ways. Just as AI has been used to create more efficient and cost-effective solar panels, it will streamline solar panel installation and maintenance. For example, Stanford researchers developed a machine-learning algorithm to identify the best places to install solar panels.

To ensure a reliable and efficient grid, using AI is imperative to predict the capacity levels of variable renewable energy sources. As sensors become more widely used, solar and wind generation can provide enormous amounts of real-time data, which can help AI predict capacity levels. Blackouts are more likely to occur if grid inertia is absent.

Moreover, some of these startups also deploy apps that use data and machine learning to analyze the most economical way for customers to buy solar power. Solar energy startups can optimize operations and identify new revenue streams with their Intelligent power platform with predictive analytics tools. 

Some solar energy companies also offer apps that tell homeowners when they can expect their battery bank to charge or discharge so they can take steps to make sure they don’t lose power during peak hours or blackout periods. AI can also allow customers to monitor their energy usage from any location with Wi-Fi connectivity.

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Top 20 innovative startups applying AI to the solar industry

Here are some of the top solar energy AI startups you need to know about if you want to stay on top of the latest technology.

1. SmartHelio

SmartHelio wants to be the doctor for solar plants: we remotely diagnose existing problems, predict faults, and prescribe solutions in real time. Our team comprises highly skilled engineers and scientists with deep domain knowledge of solar technology and data science.

• Country: Switzerland

• Founders: Govinda Upadhyay

• Founded: 2019

• Applications and projects:

Predict solar assets’ fault: Innovative diagnostics and predictive solutions. This solution prescribes timely actions to help you manage your solar assets proactively.

2. Solavio

Solavio Labs was started by engineers who wanted to develop innovative technologies and engineering solutions for improving the performance of solar power plants. Their decisions are based on what is best for our customers and help increase the global solar footprint.

• Country: India

• Founders: Prashant Goel and Suraj Mohan

• Founded: 2017

• Applications and projects: 

1. Autonomous solar panel cleaning dependable BOT

Lightweight, fully autonomous, or portable bots that use superior dry cleaning technology for ground mount & carport installations.

2. Autonomous solar panel cleaning Independent Bot

Inspired by the floor cleaning bot, these fully autonomous & remote-controlled bots are best suited for your rooftops.

3. Autonomous solar panel cleaning Eco Bot

Fast, lightweight & shareable, the eco bots are compatible with a rooftop, ground mount, and single-axis trackers.

3. Tespack

Tespack focuses on Smart Mobile Energy. They combine Hardware & Software Energy solutions for rescue personnel, governments, and extreme athletes worldwide.

• Country: Finland

• Founders: Caritta Seppa, Mario Aguilera, Yesika A Robles and Yesika Aguilera

• Founded: 2015

• Applications and projects:

SMART SOLAR MEDIA SYSTEM (S²MS)

World’s first smartest modular power station that can turn any space into a smart classroom. Energy platform available to collect energy statistics, track your S²MS at all times, send SOS alerts to your HQ or local authorities, and many more smart features.

4. Suncast

Suncast applies Artificial Intelligence to renewable energies.

• Country: Chile

• Founders: Constanza Levicán

• Founded: 2018

• Applications and projects:

1. Energy Forecasting

High-accuracy models perform energy forecasts in photovoltaic power plants. These models use the latest techniques of Machine Learning that consider the localized weather and the historical energy yield of the power plant.

2. Predictive Maintenance

Suncast applies Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to estimate the soiling in photovoltaic modules. Their alert system assesses losses, schedules cleaning, and evaluates weather while generating alarms in case of rainfall. We build this system thinking to maximize the profitability of solar power plants.r power plants.

5. Scopito

Scopito offers cloud-based software for efficient visual data management.

• Country: Denmark

• Founders: Ken Falk

• Founded: 2014

• Applications and projects: Scopito inspection software for Solar PV

Scopito alleviates the pain of managing large data sets with fast-loading images, smart keystrokes, and AI fault detection.

6. Sunai

SUNAI is a global company that optimizes O&M management in solar plants with its software NEURAL from 2019.

• Country: Chile

• Founders: Cristóbal Parrado

• Founded: 2018

• Applications and projects: NEURAL

NEURAL is a platform that gives operational guidelines to O&M teams that ensure the use of the maximum potential of solar plants.

7. AmphibiousAI

The vision of AmphibiousAI is to manufacture green and sustainable amphibious autonomous cars which can be used for both land and underwater travel and tourism purposes without affecting the marine ecosystem.

• Country: USA

• Founders: Gurpreet Singh

• Founded: 2021

• Applications and projects: Amphibious AI Cars

Autonomous cars can be used for land and underwater travel and tourism without affecting the marine ecosystem.

8. ENFOR

ENFOR provides several forecast solutions which help transmission system operators manage the power grid efficiently

• Country: Denmark

• Founders: Torben Skov Nielsen

• Founded: 2006

• Applications and projects: SolarFor™

SolarFor™ is a software solution for solar power forecasting. SolarFor delivers highly accurate predictions of solar power production for the operational horizon (ranging from a few minutes ahead in time up to a couple of weeks). 

9. Infra Solar

Infra Solar focuses on digitizing electricity consumption, optimizing electric mobility, and energy consumption management.

• Country: Brazil

• Founders: Gabriel Pereira

• Founded: 2018

• Applications and projects: Power Management

Infra Solar uses Artificial Intelligence to model efficient operations, detect anomalies, predict energy-saving opportunities and help companies act in real-time.

10. Loggma

Loggma is the all-in-one digital energy company that serves end-to-end solutions in an area where energy exists.

• Country: Turkey

• Founders: Mustafa Ozan Tuncan and Erkin Çakar

• Founded: 2018

• Applications and projects:

1. Solarify: More energy generation with artificial intelligence. Solarify is an artificial intelligence-based performance monitoring, analysis, and business management platform for solar power plants.

2. Enerify: Energy efficiency for a better future. All in one energy monitoring platform. 

11. Solar Captus

Solar Captus builds a radically different approach to selling solar using machine learning on satellite imagery.

• Country: Australia

• Founders: Jelmer van Rooij, Peter Tylee

• Founded: 2016

• Applications and projects: Solar Captus platform (Online sales flow, Quoting, Lead management)

Quick scan powered by AI technology. With just a street address, the Solar captus system shows customers exactly how many solar panels their roof can fit and provides them with a digital buying experience — all from their website!

12. Solar Inspectron AI

Solar Inspectron AI is a technology service that enables the automated processing of drone thermal inspections of Solar Farms. It uniquely creates IEC 62446 compliant Thermal and RGB maps while speeding up the data acquisition process more than three times.

• Country: Greece

• Founders: Alexis Kanter

• Founded: 2021

• Applications and projects: 

Automate Drone Thermal Inspections of PV Assets with Solar Inspectron AI. Solar Inspectron AI is a Computer Vision and Artificial Intelligence tool that enables fast, accurate, and verifiable detection of defects found in solar panels.

13. Glint Solar

Glint Solar Identifies and analyses the best solar sites faster. Glint Solar uses satellite data and machine learning to identify and analyze the best greenfield sites.

• Country: Norway

• Founders: Even Kvelland, Harald Olderheim, John Modin

• Founded: 2020

• Applications and projects: Site Prospecting

This tool will help you make informed decisions. Glint Solar provides dynamic, data-driven results using machine learning and satellite data to help you find and size viable greenfield sites for solar development.

Both Glint Solar and Omdena collaborated to identify the optimal locations for floating solar installations using satellite data. 

The team of more than 30 Omdena AI engineers collaborated with Norwegian cleantech startup Glint Solar to use AI to augment their solar site assessment tool for floating solar panels.

The project goal was to apply remote sensing techniques on satellite imagery to infer the depth of inland water bodies. This information can be added to GlintSolar´s solar site assessment tool to identify suitable sites and accelerate the green energy revolution.

14. Absolar

CleanTech, GreenTech, Carbon Reduction intelligence in the built environment through innovative data analysis and emerging technologies.

• Country: UK

• Founders: Dr. Phil Wu and Nic Cory

• Founded: 2019

• Applications and projects:

1. Remote Solar Survey: 

Absolar uses its advanced AI-based technologies to scan a building, portfolio, or city to establish solar potential, allowing you to make accurate decisions quickly.

2. Solar Audits

Carrying out detailed design work, and full business cases that include assessing your energy profile and obtaining required permissions and approvals to reduce project risk.

3. Solar Installations

We manage the design, funding, and installation with our trusted and accredited teams, providing occupiers, landlords, and investors with quality solar installations.ons.

15. Instylesolar

Instyle Solar is an award-winning solar company in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide & Perth; it offers personalized in-home consultations.

• Country: Australia

• Founders: Karl Brown

• Founded: 2015

• Applications and projects: Solar Monitoring and Analytics

Instysolar solar analytics gives you greater insight into how and when you use your solar energy. By understanding your energy usage, you can work to maximize your savings by timing your appliances and minimizing usage at night time. Solar Analytics supercharges your solar system’s feedback to give you greater insight.

16. Climatik

Energy solar company CLIMATIK provides professionals in the renewable energy industry with the most advanced technology to measure meteorological parameters. They need to offer our clients the option to choose between different sensors, technology, equipment, and suppliers to design campaigns tailored to their needs.

• Country: Mexico

• Founders: Dany Bouchard

• Founded: 2008

• Applications and projects: SOLAR ENERGY DIVISION

This area specializes in the acquisition and analysis of solar resource data.

Products: 

• METEOROLOGICAL STATIONS: Small and easy to install stations. Designed to measure multiple weather parameters and typically used for measurements in buildings, ports, airports, agriculture, or shops.

• SURVEY MAPS AND DATA SERIES: Maps showing the distribution of the solar resource (GHI, DNI, and DIF) throughout a region, country, or continent.

• SENSORS AND METEOROLOGICAL MEASUREMENT EQUIPMENT

17. Raptor Maps

Raptor Maps has been outfitting businesses for years with the tools they need in order to improve their operations. They offer lifecycle management software systems that make it easier for organizations and asset managers to keep track of everything. With these innovative solutions, solar companies can better plan their strategies – increasing performances while decreasing costs and making it possible to identify which assets are worth investing in or scrapping altogether.

• Country: United States

• Founders: Eddie Obropta, Forrest Meyen, Nikhil Vadhavkar

• Founded: 2015

• Applications and projects:

• Solar Analytics & Productivity Platform

Raptor Solar is an advanced software-as-a-service platform for the entire solar lifecycle — from financing and construction through operations.  Raptor Solar lets users optimize their PV assets, standardize data, analyze insights and collaborate.  Strengthen asset efficiency, boost staff effectiveness and ultimately lift financial return.

• Aerial Thermal Inspections & Analytics

This system identify, classify and prioritize 100% of all anomalies, mapped to a digital twin of users solar system. Users get detailed analytics and easy-to-use reports that enable them to increase power production, reduce risks, and lower operating costs.

• Inspection Data Capture Services

This service coordinates local pilots, captures data, and analyzes results. They work with data from drones or planes. Either way, users will get the most accurate inspections on the market in a detailed, actionable report.

18. Morgan Solar Inc.

Morgan Solar is a provider of low-cost solar power applications. Morgan Solar Inc founded by John Morgan and Nicolas Morgan started with a mission in 2007 to develop an idea to make solar energy more affordable. Their idea was to design an optical concentration system that would elegantly solve many of the problems of existing CPV systems.

• Country: Canada

• Founders: John Morgan and Nicolas Morgan

• Founded: 2007

• Applications and projects:

• IV DAQ & Analytics Portal

The IV DAQ and Analytics Portal is a comprehensive monitoring & analysis solution that enables revolutionary monitoring, diagnostics, and forecasting of DC-side PV plant performance. The Analytics Portal integrates IV DAQ and other sensor data, providing a comprehensive analysis and actionable insights without the high labour cost and downtime of alternatives.

• Net Zero Buildings

The SPOTlight product platform includes SPOTlight Slats and SPOTlight Energy Blinds; PV-enabled shade structures that generate power, manage light and heat, and reduce building energy consumption. SPOTlight transforms spaces to improve comfort for building occupants and deliver energy savings for building owners and managers.

19. Fulcrum3D

Fulcrum3D specializes in remote sensing, forecasting, data capture, reporting, wind, solar, and environmental measurement services.

• Country: Australia

• Founders: Andrew Durran, Colin Bonner, Martin Poole

• Founded: 2011

• Applications and projects:

1. Wind Measurement

Wind farms require comprehensive, accurate data; it is essential for their successful planning, financing, and ongoing operation. Our unique Fulcrum3D Sodar technology meets the data requirements of the wind energy industry.

• Fulcrum3D Sodar
• Wind Monitoring Met Masts
• FlightDECK
• DataVOLT
• Resources
• Forecasting

Solar Measurements:

We invented CloudCAM to measure and deliver accurate solar data. Cloud detection and solar generation forecasting assist in the management of solar fluctuations to ensure maximum return on investment.

• CloudCAM
• Solar Monitoring
• FlightDECK
• DataVOLT

2. Data Capture & Recording

FlightDECK provides secure, 24/7 access to your site data and information about your Fulcrum3D device. This online portal provides both raw and Afiltered data, for fast download that is fully secured in accordance with W3C standards.

• Environmental Monitoring
• Noise Monitoring
• FlightDECK
• DataVOLT

3. Solar and Wind Forecasting

Our precision devices allow us to provide accurate forecasts for power generation in solar and wind energy production. These forecasts ensure energy providers match their provided estimates to AEMO, maximising return on investment.

20. Palmetto Clean Technology

Palmetto is a clean energy marketplace, streamlining the process and lowering the cost for homeowners from renewable sources like solar.

• Country: United States

• Founders: Christopher Kemper

• Founded: 2009

• Applications and projects:

• SOLAR ENERGY SYSTEM

Palmetto end-to-end solar energy is the solutions for the homeowner who cares about savings and service.

• End-To-End Clean Energy Software And Fulfillment Platform

Palmetto streamlines the solar process, connecting buyers, sellers, lenders, and installers through a single platform. From intelligent targeting and system design to customer support and more, they offer solutions for any business looking to unlock growth in the clean energy segment.