Infrared Vision Based Automatic Navigation and Inspection Strategy for Photovoltaic Power Plant Using UAVs

In order to improve the effectiveness and reliability of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) automatic navigation and inspection for large photovoltaic (PV) power plants, a strategy of navigation and inspection based on infrared vision was proposed, according to the arrangement characteristics of PV strings. In order to implement the strategy, a PV strings recognition and localization algorithm combining color features and shape features was proposed to obtain information that can be used for navigation. At the same time, a navigation strategy based on the location of PV strings was presented for PV strings inspection. Experiments clearly demonstrated the adaptability and real-time of the proposed method, which makes a contribution to the automatic navigation and inspection for large PV power plants.