# A Generative AI Technique for Synthesizing a Digital Twin for U.S. Residential Solar Adoption and Generation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.08098 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.08098/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 3 of its 53 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 10 Oct 2024.

## Builds on (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [A Unified Approach to Interpreting Model Predictions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.07874/) (2017)
- [XGBoost: A Scalable Tree Boosting System](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1603.02754/) (2016)
- [Tabular Data: Deep Learning is Not All You Need](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.03253/) (2021)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Residential rooftop solar adoption is considered crucial for reducing carbon emissions. The lack of photovoltaic (PV) data at a finer resolution (e.g., household, hourly levels) poses a significant roadblock to informed decision-making. We discuss a novel methodology to generate a highly granular, residential-scale realistic dataset for rooftop solar adoption across the contiguous United States. The data-driven methodology consists of: (i) integrated machine learning models to identify PV adopters, (ii) methods to augment the data using explainable AI techniques to glean insights about key features and their interactions, and (iii) methods to generate household-level hourly solar energy output using an analytical model. The resulting synthetic datasets are validated using real-world data and can serve as a digital twin for modeling downstream tasks. Finally, a policy-based case study utilizing the digital twin for Virginia demonstrated increased rooftop solar adoption with the 30% Federal Solar Investment Tax Credit, especially in Low-to-Moderate-Income communities.