Cleantech startup Skilancer Solar today announced the launch of its autonomous waterless robot for the cleaning of small-scale solar power plants installed on residential rooftops. This product will be an addition to their portfolio which till now has an AI-powered waterless robot for the cleaning of large scale industrial solar plants. With this, they aim to capture the residential market which has a capacity of 4400 MW and is expected to reach 8500MW by the end of 2020. For the first 3 months, they plan to market the product in the states of Haryana, Delhi, and Gujarat post which they will increase the supply chain.
With the rise in water-related problems, water scarcity being one of them, the need for an efficient cleaning technology is critical to not only save water but also for promoting the adoption of alternative energy usage in the country. India has witnessed a sharp rise in interest and awareness in the solar energy space and this has led to growth in the number of solar plant installations and a decrease in the cost of solar power. However, most products in the market today are only for utility-scale solar plants and the residential market is still untapped.
The cost of solar electricity is directly proportional to the power generation efficiency of a solar plant. It is required that solar panels be cleaned periodically to optimize production efficiency. The major loss which occurs in the solar plant is the loss due to dust and debris deposition and this may vary from 7%-26%. Traditional manual cleaning happens at a frequency of 15 days and is thus not the most effective. Skilancer Solar’s autonomous robotic solution addresses this problem by cleaning the panels every day, or on-demand, without any substantial human intervention. Skilancer Solar’s robots are already being used by top industrialists like TATA, Adani, HP Petroleum, Shree Cement amongst others.
Commenting on the launch, Mr. Manish Das, Co-Founder, and Director-Business, Skilancer Solar said “ Solar panels are often portrayed as a magical means to bring the electricity bills down. In a way it is correct but only if they are kept clean every day. With the solar boom, people have shown aggressiveness to install small scale solar power plants on their residential roofs, but the irony is that there is a lack of awareness on keeping them clean which also affects efficiency. The lockdown has pushed us towards automating manual processes and with the launch of this product, we want to encourage more people to install solar panels as maintenance will become cheaper.”
Adding to this, Mr. Neeraj Kumar, Co-Founder, and Director-ˇTechnology, Skilancer Solar said “Our aim has always been to innovate at the helm of technology and clean energy. With this product also we want to bring the benefits of water-efficiency and power efficiency to the everyday lives of people who are already opting for the alternative energy route. With the government’s push for vocal for local, we believe this is the right time for us to expand our product portfolio as we manufacture all our robots in India.”