Hourly global solar radiation prediction based on seasonal and stochastic feature

You Li; Yafei Wang; Hui Qian; Weijun Gao; Hiroatsu Fukuda; Weisheng Zhou

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e19823

Hourly global solar radiation prediction based on seasonal and stochastic feature

Heliyon. 2023 Sep 6;9(9):e19823. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e19823. eCollection 2023 Sep.

Authors

You Li^{1

2}, Yafei Wang³, Hui Qian¹, Weijun Gao³, Hiroatsu Fukuda³, Weisheng Zhou⁴

Affiliations

¹ Dual-carbon Research Center, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, China.
² Asia-Japan Research Institute, Ritsumeikan University, Ibaraki 567-8570, Japan.
³ Faculty of Environmental Engineering, The University of Kitakyushu, Kitakyushu, 808-0135, Japan.
⁴ College of Policy Science, Ritsumeikan University, Ibaraki, 567-8570, Japan.

Abstract

Accurate and detailed solar radiation data play a crucial role in the simulation of building thermal and photovoltaic systems. However, developing a highly precise and dependable solar radiation model using cost-effective data has proven challenging. This work proposes a new attenuation solar radiation model formed by conducting a comprehensive analysis of existing models and gaining new insights into solar radiation's seasonal and stochastic properties. Meanwhile, the model is constructed using easily obtainable surface meteorological parameters. The results demonstrate that the proposed model exhibits good performance in terms of prediction accuracy. Moreover, the majority of existing hourly solar radiation models have been primarily developed for clear-sky conditions. However, there is a growing demand for solar radiation hourly estimations that can uphold a high level of accuracy and reliability even in different weather state. Conversely, the proposed model is developed and validated by more than twenty year's meteorological data encompassing various weather conditions in Japan. It effectively captures the stochastic nature of solar radiation by utilizing turbidity parameters, even on cloudy and rainy days. Additionally, the inclusion of interaction variables significantly enhances its interpretability.

Keywords: Hourly solar radiation forecast; Layer-by-layer weakening model; Regression analysis; Seasonal and stochastic feature; Surface meteorological parameters.