Solar and utility inspection
Find the underperforming strings before the production report does.
Thermal and visual capture of solar arrays, substations and line assets, with every anomaly located on a plan and ranked. For O&M teams, asset owners and EPCs.
Canada-wide · Transport Canada Advanced RPAS · Commercially insured
An array of ten thousand panels, inspected the same way every time.
This is for O&M teams, asset owners, EPC contractors and consultants responsible for solar arrays, substations and utility assets, who need to know what is failing before it shows up as lost production or an outage.
Walking an array with a handheld thermal camera takes days and covers a fraction of it. Ground crews near energised equipment need clearances and outages. A production report tells you something is wrong but not where.
A drone thermal survey covers the whole array in a morning at consistent irradiance, and every anomaly comes back with a location, a temperature and a visual pair. That turns "we are down two percent" into a list of strings to fix, in order.
Performance
Every anomaly, located
Hot cells, hot strings, diode faults, soiling and shading, each with a coordinate, a thermal image and a visual pair. Ranked by likely production impact.
Commissioning and warranty
Evidence, not opinion
A dated thermal baseline at commissioning and at warranty milestones, so a claim rests on images rather than argument.
Safety
Nobody near the energised gear
Substations, switchyards and line hardware inspected from the air with nothing de-energised and no one in the approach zone.
Deliverables
What you get
Radiometric thermal capture
Infrared imagery of every panel at the correct irradiance and overlap, with temperatures readable per pixel.
Visual capture
High resolution RGB of the same coverage, so each thermal finding has a visible cause to look at.
Anomaly report
Findings by type and severity, each with location on the site plan, module identifier where labelling allows, and images. PDF plus a CSV you can load into your O&M system.
Site orthomosaic
A measurable map of the array or yard, useful for vegetation, drainage and access planning.
Substation and structure imagery
Systematic stills of bushings, insulators, connections, conductors and structures, organised by asset.
Repeatable baseline
Same flight plan next quarter or next year, so trends are visible.
- Turnaround
- Agreed at scoping, matched to your O&M or warranty cycle
- Delivery
- Shared folder, PDF report, CSV of findings, browser viewer for the map
- Licensing
- You own every file, for any use.
How it works
Scope, fly, report.
Scoping call
Site size, layout drawings if you have them, what the report needs to plug into. We plan the flight for irradiance, sun angle and airspace.
Capture
Thermal and visual flown in the same visit, at the overlap the analysis needs. A ten hectare array is typically a single morning.
Analysis and report
Anomalies classified, located and ranked. Delivered as a report and as data, with a call to walk through it if useful.
01
Scoping call
Site size, layout drawings if you have them, what the report needs to plug into. We plan the flight for irradiance, sun angle and airspace.
02
Capture
Thermal and visual flown in the same visit, at the overlap the analysis needs. A ten hectare array is typically a single morning.
03
Analysis and report
Anomalies classified, located and ranked. Delivered as a report and as data, with a call to walk through it if useful.
Compliance
Compliance, in plain terms
Nothing here is a selling point. It is the minimum you should demand from anyone who flies on your site.
Transport Canada Advanced RPAS certificate
The advanced certificate is the one that permits flight in controlled airspace and near people. Every operator Lensdrone dispatches holds it.
Commercial liability insurance
Insured for commercial RPAS operations. Certificate of insurance available on request, naming your company where required.
NAV CANADA airspace authorisation
Controlled airspace near airports needs authorisation before each flight. We handle the request and build the lead time into scheduling.
SFOC where needed
Large arrays sometimes justify beyond visual line of sight flight to cover them efficiently, which needs a Special Flight Operations Certificate. We tell you up front whether your site does, and manage the application.
Site safety briefing
We attend your site orientation, follow your PPE and access rules, and brief your team on where and when we are flying.
Pricing
Quoted per project. Tell us about the site and you get a scope and a number.
What moves it
- Array size in MW or hectares
- Thermal plus RGB
- Anomaly report format
In practice
What it looks like on a real job
Solar O&M contractor
Ground-mount array, about 5 MW
- The problem
- A 5 MW array underperforming by a few percent with no obvious cause and no time to walk every string with a handheld camera.
- What we captured
- Thermal and visual capture of the full array in one morning, anomaly report with locations and severity.
- What changed
- Two failed combiner inputs and a shaded corner accounted for the loss. The crew went straight to the affected strings.
FAQ
Questions people ask before booking
What conditions do you need for thermal on solar?
Clear sky, irradiance above roughly 600 W/m², and low wind. That usually means late morning to early afternoon on a sunny day. We schedule around it and will move a visit rather than deliver a thermal set that cannot be trusted.
Can you match findings to our module or string labels?
Yes, if you can give us the as-built layout. Findings are then reported by the identifiers your O&M team already uses. Without a layout, findings are located by coordinate and on the orthomosaic.
Do you inspect substations and transmission assets?
Yes. Systematic visual capture of bushings, insulators, connections and structures, and thermal where a hot connection is suspected. We stay outside limits of approach and coordinate with your operations people before flying.
How large a site can you cover?
Sites up to a few hundred hectares are routine. Larger ones are flown over more than one day or with a beyond visual line of sight authorisation, which we scope with you.
Who owns the data?
You do. It goes into your O&M system, your warranty file, your investor report. No licence, no expiry.
Next step
Tell us about the site.
Anywhere in Canada. Send the basics and Ben will come back as soon as he can with a scope and a price. If you would rather talk, call.
- Call Ben
- +1 778 889 9306
- Ballpark in 60 seconds
- Instant estimate