DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF AN IOT-BASED SOLAR POWER MONITORING SYSTEM

This project successfully developed, implemented, and tested an IoT-based solar panel performance monitoring system designed to measure and track key parameters such as voltage, current, light intensity (Lux), power, and load percentage. The motivation was to create an affordable and reliable solution for real-time and long-term solar performance analysis, enabling better management and optimization of renewable energy resources. Using an ESP32 microcontroller as the central control unit, the system collected sensor data, displayed it on a 16x2 LCD for immediate feedback, and transmitted it to the cloud via IFTTT for storage in Google Sheets, ensuring easy remote access and historical tracking. Calibration improved sensor accuracy, with the voltage sensor achieving less than 1.5% error and the current sensor maintaining under 5% error margins. Testing under varied lighting and load conditions confirmed the system’s stability and responsiveness, including realistic behavior under PWM-controlled load variations. A comparative performance test between monocrystalline and polycrystalline panels revealed similar current outputs but slightly higher average power from the polycrystalline panel (0.9252 W vs. 0.9124 W). The results show the system is practical for homes, schools, research, and small solar farms, offering a simple yet powerful tool for performance assessment. Recommendations for future improvement include using more accurate light sensors, adding battery monitoring, integrating a real-time clock, developing a mobile or web dashboard, improving weatherproofing, adding alert notifications, and scaling the system for multi-panel monitoring. This work demonstrates how low-cost, open-source IoT technology can enhance solar energy management and support informed decision-making in renewable energy applications.