PVGIS
Photovoltaic Geographical Information System (PVGIS) is a web site that gives you information about solar radiation and PhotoVoltaic (PV) system performance. You can use PVGIS to calculate how much energy you can get from different kinds of PV systems at nearly any place in the world, except the North and South Poles.
- How much electricity could photovoltaics produce where I live?
- How does production change over the year?
- How much does a battery help to use all the electricity produced?
- Free and open access to photovoltaic (PV) electricity generation potential for different technologies and configurations.
- Available in English, French, Italian, Spanish and German.
- No registration.
- Extensive supporting documentation.
- First time user? Check out the Getting started section.
- APIs for fast, automated access needs.
- Maps of solar resource and PV potential, by country or region, in ready to print files.
In some areas we don't yet have the necessary data, especially solar radiation data. If you choose a place where there are no data, you will get a message in red to the right of the map, saying "Location without data". In some areas we have data on the terrain but not solar radiation, so you can download the horizon height but nothing else. Then the warning will be: "Location without radiation data. Just horizon data available". The next shows a map of the extent of the different solar radiation data sets used in PVGIS.
Photovoltaic systems convert the energy of sunlight into electric energy. Although PV modules produce direct current (DC) electricity, often the modules are connected to an Inverter which converts the DC electricity into AC, which can then be used locally or sent to the electricity grid. This type of PV system is called grid-connected PV. The calculation of the energy production assumes that all the energy that is not used locally can be sent to the grid.
| Input field | Description |
|---|---|
| Solar radiation database |  |
| PV Technology |  |
| Installed peak power | This is the power that the manufacturer declares that the PV array can produce under standard test conditions (STC). |
| System loss | The estimated system losses are all the losses in the system, which cause the power actually delivered to the electricity grid to be lower than the power produced by the PV modules. There are several causes for this loss, such as losses in cables, power inverters, dirt (sometimes snow) on the modules and so on. Over the years the modules also tend to lose a bit of their power, so the average yearly output over the lifetime of the system will be a few percent lower than the output in the first years. |
| Mounting position |  |
| Slope of PV modules |  |
| Azimuth (orientation) of PV modules |  |
| Optimizing slope (and maybe azimuth) | Do not activate |
| PV electricity cost calculation | tbd |
The outputs of the calculation consist of annual average values of energy production and in-plane solar irradiation, as well as graphs of the monthly values.
