Photovoltaic assembly for use in diffuse weather conditions and related methods

A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions, wherein the instructions are executable by a processor to implement:

• receiving site specific data;
• receiving field data at a site of an array of photovoltaic members;
• determining a current tracked irradiance of the array of photovoltaic members;
• calculating a predicted irradiance for multiple orientations of the array of photovoltaic members based on the site specific data and the field data:
• determining a maximum predicted irradiance from the calculated predicted irradiance;
• comparing the maximum predicted irradiance with the current tracked irradiance;
• and
• communicating instructions for re-orienting the array of photovoltaic members to an orientation having the maximum predicted irradiance if the maximum predicted irradiance is greater than the current tracked irradiance.

An apparatus comprising:

• a server, the server comprising a processor;
• an array of photovoltaic members located at a site, the array including a tracker controller, the tracker controller communicatively coupled with the server, the tracker controller configured to re-orient the photovoltaic array based on instructions from the server;
• at least one of one or more fixed irradiance sensors mounted at different rotational orientations relative to the site or at least one non-rotated irradiance sensor, the one or more fixed irradiance sensors configured to sense a current sensed irradiance and the at least one non-rotated irradiance sensor configured to sense a non-rotated irradiance;
• and
• an irradiance sensor configured to sense a current tracked irradiance of the rotating array of photovoltaic members,
• wherein the processor is configured to communicate an orientation to the tracker controller to re-orient the array of photovoltaic members based on the current sensed irradiance and the current tracked irradiance or to re-orient the array of photovoltaic members to a non-rotated position if the non-rotated irradiance is greater than the current tracked irradiance.

A photovoltaic assembly comprising:

• one or more photovoltaic members;
• and
• a solar tracker communicatively coupled with the one or more photovoltaic members, the solar tracker configured to control a rotational orientation of the one or more photovoltaic members relative to the sun based on a particular predicted irradiance corresponding to one desired metric of predicted irradiance for multiple orientations of the one or more photovoltaic members if the particular predicted irradiance is optimal with respect to a current tracked irradiance of the one or more photovoltaic members,
• wherein the predicted irradiance for multiple orientations of the one or more photovoltaic members is based on site data associated with a site for locating the one or more photovoltaic members and real-time sensed field data associated with one or more conditions which affect an amount of irradiance from the sun being incident on the one or more photovoltaic members.