scholarly journals The Performance Assessment of Six Global Horizontal Irradiance Clear Sky Models in Six Climatological Regions in South Africa

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 2583
Author(s):  
Brighton Mabasa ◽  
Meena D. Lysko ◽  
Henerica Tazvinga ◽  
Nosipho Zwane ◽  
Sabata J. Moloi

This study assesses the performance of six global horizontal irradiance (GHI) clear sky models, namely: Bird, Simple Solis, McClear, Ineichen–Perez, Haurwitz and Berger–Duffie. The assessment is performed by comparing 1-min model outputs to corresponding clear sky reference 1-min Baseline Surface Radiation Network quality controlled GHI data from 13 South African Weather Services radiometric stations. The data used in the study range from 2013 to 2019. The 13 reference stations are across the six macro climatological regions of South Africa. The aim of the study is to identify the overall best performing clear sky model for estimating minute GHI in South Africa. Clear sky days are detected using ERA5 reanalysis hourly data and the application of an additional 1-min automated detection algorithm. Metadata for the models’ inputs were sourced from station measurements, satellite platform observations, reanalysis and some were modelled. Statistical metrics relative Mean Bias Error (rMBE), relative Root Mean Square Error (rRMSE) and the coefficient of determination (R2) are used to categorize model performance. The results show that each of the models performed differently across the 13 stations and in different climatic regions. The Bird model was overall the best in all regions, with an rMBE of 1.87%, rRMSE of 4.11% and R2 of 0.998. The Bird model can therefore be used with quantitative confidence as a basis for solar energy applications when all the required model inputs are available.


Geomatics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 429-450
Author(s):  
Brighton Mabasa ◽  
Meena D. Lysko ◽  
Sabata J. Moloi

This study validates the hourly satellite based and reanalysis based global horizontal irradiance (GHI) for sites in South Africa. Hourly GHI satellite based namely: SOLCAST, Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS), and Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring (CMSAF SARAH) and two reanalysis based, namely, Fifth generation European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts atmospheric reanalysis (ERA5) and Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA2) were assessed by comparing in situ measured data from 13 South African Weather Service radiometric stations, located in the country’s six macro climatological regions, for the period 2013–2019. The in situ data were first quality controlled using the Baseline Surface Radiation Network methodology. Data visualization and statistical metrics relative mean bias error (rMBE), relative root mean square error (rRMSE), relative mean absolute error (rMAE), and the coefficient of determination (R2) were used to evaluate the performance of the datasets. There was very good correlation against in situ GHI for the satellite based GHI, all with R2 above 0.95. The R2 correlations for the reanalysis based GHI were less than 0.95 (0.931 for ERA5 and 0.888 for MERRA2). The satellite and reanalysis based GHI showed a positive rMBE (SOLCAST 0.81%, CAMS 2.14%, CMSAF 2.13%, ERA5 1.7%, and MERRA2 11%), suggesting consistent overestimation over the country. SOLCAST satellite based GHI showed the best rRMSE (14%) and rMAE (9%) combinations. MERRA2 reanalysis based GHI showed the weakest rRMSE (37%) and rMAE (22%) combinations. SOLCAST satellite based GHI showed the best overall performance. When considering only the freely available datasets, CAMS and CMSAF performed better with the same overall rMBE (2%), however, CAMS showed slightly better rRMSE (16%), rMAE(10%), and R2 (0.98) combinations than CMSAF rRMSE (17%), rMAE (11%), and R2 (0.97). CAMS and CMSAF are viable freely available data sources for South African locations.



2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Nicholas Kwarikunda ◽  
Zivayi Chiguvare

Evaluation of the maximum solar energy potential of a given area for possible deployment of solar energy technologies requires assessment of clear sky solar irradiance for the region under consideration. Such localized assessment is critical for optimal sizing of the technology to be deployed in order to realize the anticipated output. As the measurements are not always available where they are needed, models may be used to estimate them. In this study, three different models were adapted for the geographical location of the area under study and used to estimate clear sky global horizontal irradiance (GHI) at three locations in the subtropical desert climate of Namibia. The three models, selected on the basis of input requirements, were used to compute clear sky GHI at Kokerboom, Arandis, and Auas. The models were validated and evaluated for performance using irradiance data measured at each of the sites for a period of three years by computing statistical parameters such as mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE), and the coefficient of determination (R2), normalized MBE, and normalized RMSE. Comparative results between modelled and measured data showed that the models fit well the measured data, with normalized root mean square error values in the range 4–8%, while the R2 value was above 98% for the three models. The adapted models can thus be used to compute clear sky GHI at these study areas as well as in other regions with similar climatic conditions.



2012 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 150-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun Qin ◽  
Kun Yang ◽  
Shunlin Liang ◽  
Wenjun Tang

AbstractPhotosynthetically active radiation (PAR) is absorbed by plants to carry out photosynthesis. Its estimation is important for many applications such as ecological modeling. In this study, a broadband transmittance scheme for solar radiation at the PAR band is developed to estimate clear-sky PAR values. The influence of clouds is subsequently taken into account through sunshine-duration data. This scheme is examined without local calibration against the observed PAR values under both clear- and cloudy-sky conditions at seven widely distributed Surface Radiation Budget Network (SURFRAD) stations. The results indicate that the scheme can estimate the daily mean PAR at these seven stations under all-sky conditions with root-mean-square error and mean bias error values ranging from 6.03 to 6.83 W m−2 and from −2.86 to 1.03 W m−2, respectively. Further analyses indicate that the scheme can estimate PAR values well with globally available aerosol and ozone datasets. This suggests that the scheme can be applied to regions for which observed aerosol and ozone data are not available.



2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-312 ◽  
Author(s):  
Afsin Gungor ◽  
Murat Gokcek ◽  
Fusun Yalcin ◽  
Abdulkadir Kocer ◽  
Ismet Faruk Yaka ◽  
...  

Knowledge of the local solar radiation is important for many applications of solar energy systems. The global solar radiation on horizontal surface at the location of interest is the most critical input parameter employed in the design and prediction of the performance of solar energy systems. In this study, 3 empirical sunshine based models are compared correlating the monthly mean daily global solar radiation on a horizontal surface with monthly mean sunshine records for Nigde, Turkey. Models are compared using coefficient of determination (R2), the root mean square error (RMSE), the mean bias error (MBE) and the t-statistic. According to our results, all the models fitted the data adequately and can be used to estimate the specific monthly global solar radiation. The t-statistic was used as the best indicator; this indicator depends on both, and is more effective for determining the model performance. The agreement between the estimated and the measured data were remarkable and the method was recommended for use in Nigde, Turkey.



Author(s):  
Adeyemi Babatunde ◽  
Omole Opeyemi Vincent

In this paper, daily satellite data of global and diffuse irradiances obtained from the archives of National Centre for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) and National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) covering a period of ten years (2005-2014) have been employed to study clearness index (KT) and diffuse fraction (KD) distributions over six carefully selected meteorological stations in Nigeria. These stations are Port Harcourt, Akure and Enugu in the coastal region; Kano, Maiduguri and Bauchi in the sahelian region. Results have shown that while global irradiance show double peaks in its mean annual daily variation at both regions, diffuse radiation only show this in the sahelian region. In the coastal region, its values are almost uniform throughout the year .In observing the synoptic hourly distribution of clearness index and diffuse fraction, it was found that while clearness index exhibits minima values at hours close to sunrise and sunset, the reverse is the case for diffuse fraction. Also that in the coastal region, clear sky condition is prevalent in Akure and Enugu at both seasons whereas in Port Harcourt, it seldomly occurs. In the sahelian region, on the other hand, clear sky condition is prevalent at both seasons. Using ANOVA method, empirical models were developed for KT. All the models at the stations and regions gave good and significant coefficient of determination R2. During the dry season months, it ranges between 0.98 and 0.99 while during the rainy season, it is 0.89 and 0.95. To further test the efficiencies of the developed models, the Mean Bias Error (MBE) and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) were computed. Values obtained for both MBE and RMSE for most of the stations are low and positive. These are desirable results for good and significant models. It shows that these models can be used to predict clearness index KTwith high accuracy in the selected stations and proximateones.



2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 2121
Author(s):  
Changsuk Lee ◽  
Kyunghwa Lee ◽  
Sangmin Kim ◽  
Jinhyeok Yu ◽  
Seungtaek Jeong ◽  
...  

This study proposes an improved approach for monitoring the spatial concentrations of hourly particulate matter less than 2.5 μm in diameter (PM2.5) via a deep neural network (DNN) using geostationary ocean color imager (GOCI) images and unified model (UM) reanalysis data over the Korean Peninsula. The DNN performance was optimized to determine the appropriate training model structures, incorporating hyperparameter tuning, regularization, early stopping, and input and output variable normalization to prevent training dataset overfitting. Near-surface atmospheric information from the UM was also used as an input variable to spatially generalize the DNN model. The retrieved PM2.5 from the DNN was compared with estimates from random forest, multiple linear regression, and the Community Multiscale Air Quality model. The DNN demonstrated the highest accuracy compared to that of the conventional methods for the hold-out validation (root mean square error (RMSE) = 7.042 μg/m3, mean bias error (MBE) = −0.340 μg/m3, and coefficient of determination (R2) = 0.698) and the cross-validation (RMSE = 9.166 μg/m3, MBE = 0.293 μg/m3, and R2 = 0.49). Although the R2 was low due to underestimated high PM2.5 concentration patterns, the RMSE and MBE demonstrated reliable accuracy values (<10 μg/m3 and 1 μg/m3, respectively) for the hold-out validation and cross-validation.



Agronomy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1207
Author(s):  
Gonçalo C. Rodrigues ◽  
Ricardo P. Braga

This study aims to evaluate NASA POWER reanalysis products for daily surface maximum (Tmax) and minimum (Tmin) temperatures, solar radiation (Rs), relative humidity (RH) and wind speed (Ws) when compared with observed data from 14 distributed weather stations across Alentejo Region, Southern Portugal, with a hot summer Mediterranean climate. Results showed that there is good agreement between NASA POWER reanalysis and observed data for all parameters, except for wind speed, with coefficient of determination (R2) higher than 0.82, with normalized root mean square error (NRMSE) varying, from 8 to 20%, and a normalized mean bias error (NMBE) ranging from –9 to 26%, for those variables. Based on these results, and in order to improve the accuracy of the NASA POWER dataset, two bias corrections were performed to all weather variables: one for the Alentejo Region as a whole; another, for each location individually. Results improved significantly, especially when a local bias correction is performed, with Tmax and Tmin presenting an improvement of the mean NRMSE of 6.6 °C (from 8.0 °C) and 16.1 °C (from 20.5 °C), respectively, while a mean NMBE decreased from 10.65 to 0.2%. Rs results also show a very high goodness of fit with a mean NRMSE of 11.2% and mean NMBE equal to 0.1%. Additionally, bias corrected RH data performed acceptably with an NRMSE lower than 12.1% and an NMBE below 2.1%. However, even when a bias correction is performed, Ws lacks the performance showed by the remaining weather variables, with an NRMSE never lower than 19.6%. Results show that NASA POWER can be useful for the generation of weather data sets where ground weather stations data is of missing or unavailable.



2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 2805
Author(s):  
Hongwei Sun ◽  
Junyu He ◽  
Yihui Chen ◽  
Boyu Zhao

Sea surface partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) is a critical parameter in the quantification of air–sea CO2 flux, which plays an important role in calculating the global carbon budget and ocean acidification. In this study, we used chlorophyll-a concentration (Chla), sea surface temperature (SST), dissolved and particulate detrital matter absorption coefficient (Adg), the diffuse attenuation coefficient of downwelling irradiance at 490 nm (Kd) and mixed layer depth (MLD) as input data for retrieving the sea surface pCO2 in the North Atlantic based on a remote sensing empirical approach with the Categorical Boosting (CatBoost) algorithm. The results showed that the root mean square error (RMSE) is 8.25 μatm, the mean bias error (MAE) is 4.92 μatm and the coefficient of determination (R2) can reach 0.946 in the validation set. Subsequently, the proposed algorithm was applied to the sea surface pCO2 in the North Atlantic Ocean during 2003–2020. It can be found that the North Atlantic sea surface pCO2 has a clear trend with latitude variations and have strong seasonal changes. Furthermore, through variance analysis and EOF (empirical orthogonal function) analysis, the sea surface pCO2 in this area is mainly affected by sea temperature and salinity, while it can also be influenced by biological activities in some sub-regions.



Food Research ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 703-711
Author(s):  
A.S. Ajala ◽  
P.O. Ngoddy ◽  
J.O. Olajide

Cassava roots are susceptible to deterioration with 24 hrs of harvest; it needs processing into a more stable material such as dried cassava chips to extend its shelf life for long storage. However, improper knowledge of the effect of atmospheric relative humidity on these dried chips during storage makes it mouldy and unacceptable. This work aimed at studying the effect of sorption isotherms on the dried cassava chips. In this study, adsorption and desorption isotherm were carried out using static gravimetric method and data for equilibrium moisture content (EMC) were generated at five (5) temperatures (53, 60, 70, 80, 86oC). These were fitted into four (4) isotherm-models [Oswin, Peleg, the Modified Oswin and GAB]. The statistical criteria to test the models were coefficient of determination (R2 ), reduced chi-square (χ 2 ), root mean square error (RMSE) and mean bias error (MBE). The values of EMC ranged from 7.21-12.44% wb. The values of R2 ranged from 0.95-0.99; χ 2 ranged from 0.008-0.14; RMSE values ranged from 0.06-0.254 while MBE values ranged from -0.0004-1.1E-5. The values of isosteric heat of sorption calculated from the isosteres recorded a range from 6.579 to 67.829 kJ/mole. The Pelegmodel gave the best fit in the relative humidity range of 10 to 80%. The values of EMC show that the chips can have a stable shelf life without spoilage.



2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 1905-1915 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenjun Tang ◽  
Kun Yang ◽  
Jun Qin ◽  
Xin Li ◽  
Xiaolei Niu

Abstract. The recent release of the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP) HXG cloud products and new ERA5 reanalysis data enabled us to produce a global surface solar radiation (SSR) dataset: a 16-year (2000–2015) high-resolution (3 h, 10 km) global SSR dataset using an improved physical parameterization scheme. The main inputs were cloud optical depth from ISCCP-HXG cloud products; the water vapor, surface pressure and ozone from ERA5 reanalysis data; and albedo and aerosol from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) products. The estimated SSR data were evaluated against surface observations measured at 42 stations of the Baseline Surface Radiation Network (BSRN) and 90 radiation stations of the China Meteorological Administration (CMA). Validation against the BSRN data indicated that the mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE) and correlation coefficient (R) for the instantaneous SSR estimates at 10 km scale were −11.5 W m−2, 113.5 W m−2 and 0.92, respectively. When the estimated instantaneous SSR data were upscaled to 90 km, its error was clearly reduced, with RMSE decreasing to 93.4 W m−2 and R increasing to 0.95. For daily SSR estimates at 90 km scale, the MBE, RMSE and R at the BSRN were −5.8 W m−2, 33.1 W m−2 and 0.95, respectively. These error metrics at the CMA radiation stations were 2.1 W m−2, 26.9 W m−2 and 0.95, respectively. Comparisons with other global satellite radiation products indicated that our SSR estimates were generally better than those of the ISCCP flux dataset (ISCCP-FD), the global energy and water cycle experiment surface radiation budget (GEWEX-SRB), and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES). Our SSR dataset will contribute to the land-surface process simulations and the photovoltaic applications in the future. The dataset is available at  https://doi.org/10.11888/Meteoro.tpdc.270112 (Tang, 2019).



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