These solar power plants use thousands of mirrors (heliostats) that track the sun's position and concentrate its light onto a receiver at the top of the tower. There, very high temperatures are generated, which are then converted into electricity. Despite becoming the dominant technology worldwide, their performance still depends on highly complex field operations, with thousands of heliostats, receivers, and storage systems that must function in perfect synchronization. Therefore, digitizing them is key to maximizing their efficiency, cutting costs, and accelerating their deployment.
“With the pace of growth of new tower plants worldwide, Europe now needs to close this digitalization gap to maintain its leadership and reduce costs below the targets set in the EU’s Strategic Energy Technologies Plan (SET Plan),” says Joerg Widmer, principal investigator of the project and research director at IMDEA Networks. He adds: “SUN-DT is driving concentrated solar power (CSP) tower technology into a fully digital era. By combining AI-based calibration, predictive maintenance, and real-time optimization, we are enabling plants to operate more efficiently and reliably than ever before. This project reinforces Europe’s technological leadership in renewable energy.”
IMDEA Networks is leading the development of the 5G wireless communications layer that will enable the characterization and calibration of heliostats. Its contribution is key to the large-scale deployment of this tool: it provides reliable, high-capacity links across the entire solar field, ensures robust data collection, and enables real-time feedback loops.
“We bring deep expertise in wireless sensing and network architecture, as well as testbed-level infrastructure like the NEXTONIC laboratory, which allows us to prototype and validate communication components under realistic conditions ,” explains Widmer. Digital Tools The project will develop four interoperable digital tools—HELIOSTATACC, SUN-DTWIN, D-OPT, and PREDOM—that will enable measurable improvements in the performance of concentrated solar power (CSP) plants. These technologies automate solar field calibration, create a digital twin for real-time decision-making, optimize energy dispatch (i.e., the delivery of energy to the grid at any given time), and allow for predictive maintenance.
The goal is to demonstrate:
• Greater solar field efficiency and reduction of optical losses.
• Lower cost and downtime thanks to predictive maintenance.
• Optimization of energy dispatch, facilitating the participation of CSP in auxiliary services to the grid.
• More competitive renewable generation costs, aligned with the objectives of the European SET Plan.
All these tools will be integrated into a unified SUN-DT platform, which will be tested and validated at two experimental facilities and two commercial concentrated solar power (CSP) plants: Khi Solar One in South Africa and Cerro Dominador in Chile. These plants are operated by two consortium partners and global leaders in solar energy, COX and ACCIONA respectively, and represent different CSP tower configurations. “For example, a heliostat calibration and characterization system will automatically detect any misalignment in real time and recommend corrective actions. Instead of scheduling entire rounds of maintenance, operators will adjust only the mirrors that actually require intervention. This directly improves optical efficiency and saves numerous hours of fieldwork,” Widmer concludes.
