metadata

annotations_creators:
  - machine-generated
language:
  - en
language_creators:
  - machine-generated
license:
  - mit
multilinguality:
  - monolingual
pretty_name: United Kingdom PV Solar generation
size_categories:
  - 1B<n<10B
source_datasets:
  - original
tags:
  - pv
  - photovoltaic
  - environment
  - climate
  - energy
  - electricity
task_categories:
  - time-series-forecasting
task_ids:
  - multivariate-time-series-forecasting

UK PV dataset

Domestic photovoltaic (PV) solar generation data from the United Kingdom. This dataset contains data from over 30,000 solar PV systems from 2010 to 2025. The dataset is updated with new data every few months.

About 1,309 of the solar PV systems report instantaneous readings every 5 minutes. This data is recorded in the *_5min.parquet files. Please note that this data is very noisy because these readings are instantaneous, and solar PV systems respond within milliseconds to changes in solar irradiance. And even small, wispy clouds can cause changes in solar irradiance!

All PV systems in this dataset report cumulative energy generation every 30 minutes. This data is much less noisy because it represents a true accumulation of the total energy generated in the last half hour. This cumulative value is calculated on the meter itself.

The data is recorded by professional meters, wired into the AC side.

To protect the privacy of the solar PV system owners, we have reduced the precision of the geographical location of each PV system to about 1 kilometer. If you are the owner of a PV system in the dataset, and do not want your solar data to be shared then please email us at [email protected].

This dataset is made possible by Sheffield Solar.

Files

metadata.csv: The geographical location, orientation, tilt, and generation capacity for each PV system.
data/YYYY/MM/YYYYMM_{5,30)min.parquet: Energy production data for each solar PV system, for one month.
data/YYYY/YYYY_{5,30}min.parquet: All the energy production data for an entire year in one file. Note that this "yearly" file is only created once the year is complete, and is not available for all years.

metadata.csv

Metadata of the different PV systems.

The csv columns are:

ss_id: The Sheffield Solar identifier of the solar PV system.
latitude_rounded: Latitude of the PV system, but rounded to approximately the nearest km.
longitude_rounded: Longitude of the PV system, but rounded to approximately the nearest km.
orientation: The orientation of the PV system, in degrees.
tilt: The tilt of the PV system with respect to the ground, in degrees. 0 degrees would be horizontal (parallel to the ground). 90 degrees would be standing perpendicular to the ground.
kWp: The power generation capacity of the PV system (kilowatts peak).

Legacy files (these will be removed soon):

2min.parquet: Power output for PV systems every 2 minutes.
5min.parquet: Power output for PV systems every 5 minutes.
30min.parquet: Power output for PV systems every 30 minutes.
pv.netcdf: Time series of PV solar generation every 5 minutes.
uk_pv.py

{2,5,30}min.parquet

Time series of solar generation for a number of systems. Each file includes the systems for which there is enough granularity. In particular the solar PV systems in 2min.parquet and 5min.parquet are also in 30min.parquet.

The files contain 3 columns:

ss_id: The Sheffield Solar ID of the system.
datetime_GMT: The datetime of the recording in Greenwich Mean Time (UTC+0). Each row represents data for the time period ending at the datetime_GMT. For example, a row with a timestamp of 12:00 in a 30min.parquet file would represent the total energy generated from 11:30 to 12:00.
generation_Wh: The energy generated in the period (in watt hours) at the given timestamp for the given system. One "watt hour" is the amount of energy generated in one hour if the power output is one watt. So, to calculate the average power (in watts), multiply the generation_Wh by 12 in the 5-minutely datasets; or multiple generation_Wh by 2 in the 30-minutely datasets.

pv.netcdf (legacy)

Time series data of PV solar generation data is in NetCDF format, suitable to reading by xarray.

The data variables are the same as 'ss_id' in the metadata. Each data variable contains the solar generation (in kW) for that PV system. The ss_id's here are a subset of all the ss_id's in the metadata The coordinates of the date are tagged as 'datetime' which is the datetime of the solar generation reading.

This is a subset of the more recent 5min.parquet file.

useful links

https://huggingface.co/docs/datasets/share - this repo was made by following this tutorial