Went to a solar farm open house in Fresno, left with questions

Last month I drove out to a big solar array near Fresno for their community open house. The setup is massive, about 2,000 acres of panels, and the tour guide mentioned they use goats to keep the weeds down instead of mowers. What caught my attention was the panel cleaning schedule, they only wash them twice a year because of water costs. But the ground underneath looked super dry and dusty, and I wondered if that hurts output more than they admit. They said efficiency drops maybe 8 percent between washes, which seems like a lot over thousands of panels. Does anyone here work with solar maintenance and have thoughts on dust vs water tradeoffs in dry climates? I am curious if the industry is testing dry cleaning robots or something cheaper now.

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