“Our virtues and our failings are inseparable, like force and matter. When they separate, man is no more.“
-Nikola Tesla
Team S.P.I.C.S with Honorable Advising Panel and Dean
The Celebration of Innovation
-Team S.P.I.C.S stands for Solar Panel Inspection and Cleaning System. This team has worked on innovating an autonomous Inspection & Cleaning System for large scale power plant system. This was their Final Year Design Project of group 08 consisting of 4 hardworking members named Syed Mosaddik Hossain Ifty, Sadman Islam Alif, Md Mahmudur Rahman & Aniruddha Sarkar Trishit under the supervision & guidance of ATC 01 consisting 3 honorable advisors who are Md. Mosaddequr Rahman, PhD, Professor and Chairperson, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering; Mohaimenul Islam, Senior Lecturer, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering; Aldrin Nippon Bobby,Lecturer, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering. Group 08 members are also one of the prominent members of E.P.S.R.G (Energy & Power Systems Research Group) since 2023. Consisting of 10 innovative projects of and the brilliant minds from BSRM School of Engineering the FYDP Summer-2024 project showcasing was held on 24th of October. And out of these wonderful initiative taken by the hardworking students the Group 08, Team S.P.I.C.S seized the opportunity of getting the best project award recognition. Let us deep dive about what S.P.I.C.S really is?
What is S.P.I.C.S?
–Solar Panel Inspection & Cleaning System, acronymed as S.P.I.C.S, is an all-in-one inspection & cleaning system prototype built for large scale solar power plants. As solar power is becoming the catalyst of renewable energy sectors in this 4th industrial revolution, it is a dire need for ensuring less time consuming, fully automated inspection and cleaning systems for both industrial and small scale solar panel appliances.
The reason is when dust or any kind of foreign debris covers the top layer of a photovoltaic cell, anomaly is observed in the power generation rate which gradually starts to decrease. And if this power loss is thought in a massive scale in terms of MW (Mega Watt) & GW (Giga Watt) PV power plants, a large amount of power loss is being observed.
Also, other key factors which include time constraint & major safety concerns of using Human Labor for these activities is not feasible, yet some see them as a means of saving finances which eventually doesn’t bring fruitful results.
From this research, the Group 08 observed something special which is almost all of the PV power plant giants; which are China, Middle East, India; are dedicatedly researching about how to overcome the lacking for their maintenance agenda which is an all-in-one inspection and cleaning system.
From there, the Group 08 found a praiseworthy solution which consisted the recipe of Robotics & Automations. Three major approaches were researched as a foremost criterion of FYDP while designing and developing a project and out of which an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) based inspection, wirelessly integrated with a cleaning rover over a row of a panel & ground station, was selected by the Group.
This was chosen as the best approach because separated inspection system via UAV would be capable of mapping and inspecting a large scale power plant in a very short time, and also when the UAV is inspecting for dust or any kind of fault detection in the PV cells it will send specific coordinates of the defected or dusty panel to the ground station plus, cleansing rover, and the rover will immediately start its mission on cleaning that particular PV panel. Alongside, a maintenance engineer can observe the data with ace effort.
Alongside that, this whole process is done in a Semi-Autonomous manner where one/two trained individuals are needed to run this large scale maintenance process from a central ground station.
The group have availed significant features while developing their prototype which includes UAV based inspection in a shorter time for large scale panels and wireless server based ground station for connecting the whole inspection and cleaning rover connected for all-in-one coordination.
Plus, while working with the cleaning rover the team has availed features like water cleaning, waterless cleaning, specific panel cleaning & scheduled cleaning. From the team’s test bed, they observed their whole prototype can clean 315 panels (Dimension: 510x340x25mm, 20Watt) & can inspect 75 panels in one charge from the cleaning rover and UAV.
S.P.I.C.S Technical Poster
Watch it! 1st HAND Below
The Experience of Group 08
Sadman Islam Alif
- I would like to start my experience by stating Alhamdulillah and giving my gratitudes to my Abbu, Ammu & younger brother alongside, our honorable advisor Mohaimenul sir alongwith, my incledible team Group 08 and also, to my mentors & friends from ROBU plus, my respective department EEE for guiding me to reach this far as a humble and successful individual. This was indeed a crazy roler coster ride for me & I would say I am thrilled by what opportunity might come next. There are many things I learned from every aspect while developing S.P.I.C.S and most importantly I gained back my lost confidence. Now, my future endavour would be to explore how far can I push this dream of making this creation of ours an opportunity for thousand more individuals. Indeed, Allah is the best of planners and for the future innovators I would love to say "Never Give Up while your 1st to infinite attempt of debugging. Never stop ruminating about the craziest of ideas. Never miss out happiness in small things while working. Never stop loving your loved ones. Indeed, you are gonna be a legend in the future In Sha Allah."
Syed Mosaddik Hossain Ifty
- We created a completely operational system for inspecting and cleaning solar panels as part of an inventive research project. The system included an autonomous cleaning bot and UAV-based aerial surveillance. In order to identify dust collection, our drone took real-time pictures of solar panels, which were then processed by a CNN model. The analysis allowed the system to identify particular dirty panels. After that, an ESP32-controlled bot used a water spray, spiral brush, and wiper to clean just the impacted panels. The project effectively illustrated the convergence of robots, machine learning, and the Internet of Things. A ground control station was used to synchronise all systems. The solution lowers manual labour and increases panel efficiency. It also opened doors to further industrial-grade development of smart solar maintenance technologies. And I am really blessed and thankful to my family and friends and specially Mohaimenul sir for guiding me towards a next gen. innovation.
Md Mahmudur Rahman
- With deep gratitude and pleasure to my Almighty Allah, I am feeling honored to proclaim the successful accomplishment of our project titled "Solar Panel Inspection and Cleaning System," which secured the award of The Best Engineering Project in FYDP. This milestone has been a rewarding journey with learning, various challenges, and valuable experiences that have formed my understanding and firm passion for sustainable renewable energy solutions. I would like to convey my heartfelt thanks and gratitude to our honorable advisors of ATC panel-01 , Professor Dr. Mosaddequr Rahman and Senior Lecturer Mohaimenul Islam, for their unwavering support and insightful guidance throughout the accomplishment of the project. Their expert knowledge, constructive feedback, and encouragement have been beneficial in every step from the initial concept to the final implementation. This project was aimed at designing an efficient system to inspect and clean solar panels if there are any sort of droppings, improving their energy output and reducing manual effort. Through detailed planning, research, and practical work, my incredible team has developed a working model that addresses real-world problems in solar energy maintenance. I am very grateful to my team during this project and appreciate all the hard work done by them, as without their support and effort the project would not be accomplished in such a way. The journey has not only enhanced my technical skills but also taught me the importance of perseverance, teamwork, and creative problem solving. The knowledge I’ve gained under the supervision of one of my respected advisors, Mohaimenul Islam Sir, was truly inspirational. I am looking forward to learning and developing my research skills through the Energy Research Group for my future endeavors.
Aniruddha Sarkar Trishit
- I would like to thank our respected advisor Mohaimenul Islam sir for giving us, the group No.8 proper guidance and all my group members for providing me a friendly working and learning environment. This experience for me is one to be remembered for a long time if not my entire life.During my work time on S.P.I.C.S., I got to learn about UAV systems from a hands on experience. It was completely different from learning through written sources. This experience has developed an interest in me to work on such projects in future.In my future endeavors I wish to strengthen my understanding of UAV technology and make smarter implementations like S.P.I.C.S. to make an easier and more efficient future.
Don't Miss Out! Photos ofMemories of S.P.I.C.S
