Enny enters into digitalisation partnership with Guard Automation

OBOS and Hafslund formed the solar energy company Enny in 2022. The company assists housing cooperatives and commercial buildings with the planning, installation and operation of solar power systems, and will have delivered around 20 solar power systems during 2024.

It has now been confirmed that the company is entering into a digitalisation partnership with the Sandefjord-based company Guard Automation. The goal is to improve the operation and maintenance of solar cells through continuous monitoring and smart use of operational data.

”We are very pleased to have established a partnership with Guard. It secures reliable operational data from all solar power systems in real time, regardless of the solar cell supplier. Digitalisation creates great opportunities for smarter operations and energy management,” says technical manager at Enny, Ørjan Bakkland.

He adds that the company has great ambitions for further growth, and that the new digitalisation partnership with Guard is an important part of this.

Smart operations make solar production more profitable

Simply explained, all solar power systems from Enny will be connected to the Norwegian-developed cloud platform Guard Cloud. It functions as an operational and monitoring system for Enny and their customers.

”Solar production is monitored in real time and the data is presented in a user-friendly dashboard. The technology makes it possible to compare production against historical periods and predict energy production into the future. The cloud platform can retrieve data from all kinds of sources, such as weather data from the Norwegian Meteorological Institute and electricity prices from Nord Pool,” says Hanne Torp Nilsen of Guard Automation.

Bakkland of Enny agrees with this:

”If something is wrong, we and the customer will be notified so that the error can be corrected quickly. And eventually we will move towards more condition-based monitoring of the solar power systems, in order to resolve challenges before they become a real problem,” he says, continuing:

”The solution is a giant leap forward for improving operations and maintenance. Previously we had to deal with a variety of different operational tools; in the future everything will be gathered in Guard Cloud. It will save us a lot of time. In sum, this digitalisation makes it more profitable to invest in solar cells because we can operate much smarter and gain more insight into the renewable energy production,” Bakkland says.

He believes that it is a great advantage to cooperate with a Norwegian player, as it is easier to develop the solution jointly and provides reassurance that the data is stored in Norway. Guard Automation assists close to 40 per cent of Norwegian municipalities with systems for critical infrastructure.

”We look forward to working together further to make it easier and more profitable to invest in solar production,” Torp Nilsen and Bakkland conclude.

Do you own or operate multiple solar power systems monitored in different apps?

If so, there is a high probability that you are missing out on useful insights into your production data, which could result in potential revenues vanishing like dew in the sun.

Our platform Guard Cloud can link data from all types of systems, completely independent of make and supplier.

Guard Cloud is an open and future-proof platform that gives you the insights you specifically need or want to share with the outside world.

By combining data from inverters, battery banks, energy meters, weather conditions and the electricity market, you can identify trends, optimise operations and receive alerts about anomalous production or system faults.