How We Used Deep Learning to Identify Solar Panels on 15 Million...

Information about the built environment at scale provides actionable insight that can transform a broad spectrum of industries, by enabling companies to deliver better, more targeted services to customers, telecommunications operators to perform accurate infrastructure planning, and government agencies to conduct regional planning and management. This is the vision behind Geoscape, a location-intelligence product conceived by PSMA Australia and developed in partnership with DigitalGlobe, a Maxar company, that delivers detailed information about buildings and their attributes, trees and land cover for every address in Australia. The data for each building in Geoscape includes the presence or absence of solar panels. This information is important for the insurance industry because solar panels may pose a fire hazard and thus affect insurance premiums. For firefighters, knowing if a structure has solar panels can also help them stay safe.