(1) The following general safety requirement for solar installations shall be ensured, namely: –

(i) clear pathways of minimum seventy five centimetre in width with hand rails for roof access and emergency exit shall be provided for roof top system;

(ii) there shall be clear pathways, walkways between the rows or columns of solar panels which is necessary for cleaning and maintenance;

(iii) cables shall be laid in trenches for ground based photovoltaic installation;

(iv) ground mounted solar installations shall be protected by fencing or other means not less than 1.8 metre in height so as to prevent unauthorised entry;

(v) disconnection switches or circuit breakers provided in combiner boxes to disconnect the photovoltaic system from all other conductors of the system shall be located at a readily accessible location;

(vi) three phases on the alternating current side, and positive and negative conductor on the direct current side shall be marked and identified with different colours;

(vii) inverter unit for solar photovoltaics shall be installed in the periphery of the building and as near as the solar panel:
Provided that the direct current cable shall be ultraviolet protected or routed through ultraviolet protected pipe;

(viii) there shall be a manual disconnection switch to isolate the system from grid and shall be situated outside the alternating current combiner box; and

(ix) protection shall be deployed (for both input and output) on site for overload, surge current, surge voltage, short circuit, high temperature, over voltage, under voltage and over frequency, under frequency, reverse polarity and lightning.

(2) The following earthing requirements for solar installations shall be ensured, namely: –

(i) solar earthing shall be as per the relevant standard;

(ii) the frame of inverter cabinet shall be connected with the earthing bus bar through the earthing terminals using flexible braided copper wire;

(iii) all metal casing and shielding of the plant, each array structure of the photovoltaic yard, equipment, inverters and control systems shall be earthed through proper earthing;

(iv) earthing system shall connect all non-current carrying metal receptacles, electrical boxes, appliance frames, chasis and photovoltaic module mounting structures in one long run and the earth strips shall be interconnected by proper welding and shall not be bolted;

(v) there shall be adequate number of interconnected earth pits provided in each location and minimum required gap shall be provided in between earth pits as per relevant standard.

(i) solar earthing shall be as per the relevant standard;

(3) The following protection, testing and interlocking requirement for solar installations shall be ensured; namely: –

(i) the solar photovoltaic power plant shall be provided with lightning and over voltage protection by deploying required number of lightning arresters as per the relevant standards;

(ii) every combiner box shall be provided with suitable surge protective device with arc extinguishing capability as per the relevant standards to avoid any risk of fire;

(iii) the input circuits of combiner box shall be provided with over current protection as per the relevant standards;

(iv) the output circuits of combiner box shall be provided with isolation protection;

(v) earth fault protection and insulation monitoring for photovoltaic arrays and inverters shall be provided;

(vi) all photovoltaic modules safety qualification shall comply with relevant standards.

(4) Requirement to prevent fire for solar installations. –

A fire detection system and automatic fire suppression system shall comply with the relevant standards.

(5) Additional safety requirements for floating solar photovoltaic energy installations. –

Photovoltaic modules and associated structure of floating solar power plant shall comply with the relevant standards for tests such as salt mist, ammonia corrosion, environmental stress cracking of High Density Poly Ethylene, stress cracking resistance of High Density Poly Ethylene and standard test method for tensile properties of plastics.

(6) Safety requirements for wind energy installations. –

(1) All wind energy generation systems including wind turbines, wind power plants onshore and offshore connected with the grid shall be as per relevant standards.

(2) Transformers for wind turbine applications shall be as per the relevant standards.

(3) Portable fire extinguishers shall also be kept at various locations in plants to take immediate action in case of fire.

(4) Any wind turbine workers exposed to a potential fall shall be supported by a certified fall arrest system such as a full body safety harness.