Solar Global Data: Where to Find It ??

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When someone talks about renewable energy sources the first energy came into mind is solar energy. Some university students and researchers select this field for research. However two topics are mostly selected; one is solar power plant site selection and other is solar potential calculation of specific areas. The problem associated with this topic is that the students and researchers face difficulty to gain solar data .
In this blog, I would like to share a data source where every student/researcher easily find the required data in GIS format. The most important thing is that this data is free of cost and anybody can download it easily.
The website link is http://globalsolaratlas.info/
The data provided on this website is provided by The World Bank Group in the form of atlas that is solar global atlas. The provided data is in two raster formats, GeoTIFF and ASCII grid having spatial resolution of 250 meters. 
The following mentioned data layers are provided in yearly and monthly averages of daily sum. These data layers are: 

  • GHI – Global horizontal irradiation [kWh/m2]

Source: Internet
Global horizontal irradiance is equal to total amount of radiation received per unit area on the ground (flat surface). Actually it is a sum of diffuse horizontal irradiance and direct normal irradiance. Its unit is kilo Watt hour per meter square (kWh/m2 )

  • DIF–Diffuse horizontal irradiation [kWh/m2]
Amount of radiation coming from the sun that does not directly received per unit area by a surface is called diffuse horizontal irradiance and its unit is kilo Watt hour per meter square (kWh/m2)

  • DNI – Direct normal irradiation [kWh/m2]
Amount of radiation received directly from the sun per unit area by a surface is called direct normal irradiance and its unit is kilo watt hour per meter square (kWh/m2)
The amount of radiation coming from sun received per unit area by a tilted surface is called global tilted irradiance. GTI is the sum of direct, diffuse and reflected irradiance. GTI is considered as most accurate irradiance for calculation of solar potential. Its unit also is kilo Watt hour per meter square (kWh/m2)
  • OPTA–Optimum tilt to maximize yearly yield [°]
The tilted angle of PV module at a specific orientation by which it will be able to attain higher amount of solar radiations per year is termed as OPTA. It is measured in degree.
  • PVOUT – Photo-voltaic power potential [kWh/kWp]
PVOUT is the amount of energy that is converted by a photovoltaic system into electricity. Its unit is kilo Watt hour per kilo Watt peak (kWh/kWp).

Moreover, the secondary data layers are also provided as well as solar resource data. These layers are:
  • TEMP - Air Temperature at 2 m above ground level [°C]
  • TERRAIN - include data layers of ELE (elevation above sea level ), SLO (slope [ ° ]) and AZI (azimuth [ ° ])
For further information a user guide is available at solar global atlas website as user guide where anyone can get detailed information.
For example the following maps of Pakistan are downloaded from this website.






If you require any further information, feel free to comment or email writer anytime.


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