It is important to take various environmental factors such as contour, shading objects, and the climate of the site into account for advanced PV plant design. We can use numerical simulation software such as PVsyst for design comparison.
However, it is not good to trust the simulation result too much without taking other factors such as material costs, personnel expense, and cabling loss. Because we need to keep in mind that basically all the numerical simulations overestimates the shading effect. Some people tend to push less efficient design with only the justification by the slightly better simulation result. But I am afraid it is even less advantageous as a result of higher cost and less (or tiny increase) of production.
We have developed a PV design support tool shown in the picture below to improve our design efficiency. Thanks to the tool, we can compare the use of DC cables for different designs in very short time. It enabled us to make a quantitative design change proposal quickly without compromising any reduction of PV production for customers and profits for construction people.
