Martin Schneider, the Managing Director of meteocontrol GmbH and the President of meteocontrol North America, Inc. spoke enthusiastically to PES about the technological advances in monitoring and managing energy and weather data and there are even more exciting developments on the horizon.
PES: Welcome to PES Solar/PV magazine, it’s great to talk with you. For the benefit of our new readers would you like to begin by explaining a little about the background of meteocontrol?
Martin Schneider: meteocontrol is recognized as a world leader in universal PV monitoring with 45,000+ solar plants, 13+ GWp monitored globally, and more than 40 years’ experience in the renewable energy sector. We offer monitoring energy and weather data management, hardware and software, yield reports, quality audits, and technical due diligence to support PV systems of all sizes.
meteocontrol’s blue’Log datalogger and VCOM Solar Monitoring Platform combine to provide a robust, customizable, and scalable solution for utility, commercial, and distributed generation solar portfolios.
Our independent engineering services team has supported projects with a total investment of more than $16 billion. meteocontrol’s services and products improve yields and profits for investors, project developers, and PV system operators world-wide.
Our world headquarters are based in Augsburg, Germany and we have offices located in Australia, Central America, Chile, China, France, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico and North America.
PES: Please could you tell us why you decided to start your career in the
solar industry.
MS: My main motivation was the environment and to be a part of an industry providing energy without CO2 emissions was the main driver. This decision was already clear to me during my study as an electrical engineer.
I simply wanted to spend my time in a useful way. It was not just about earning money and having a job, the motivation was very idealistic. And, by the way, during this time it was not possible to earn good money in this industry.
The company itself got into the market through an R&D project for the German Research Ministry in the 1990s. The purpose of which was to collect more information about the behavior of PV systems installed on residential rooftops. I was in the field myself at that time, having to transmit the collected data over analog modems and phone lines. Since then meteocontrol has participated in several more government research projects.
