Construction of customized atmospheric transmission model for direct solar irradiance in localized peninsular

Abstract

Taean is a small peninsular along the west coast of the mainland of Korean peninsula. It faces with the yellow sea to the west, while it is bordered with the mainland Korea to the east. The area is well known to have 1) heavy mid and high altitude air traffic, 2) busy traffic routes of ocean liners between Korea and neighboring countries and 3) complex and rapid changes in its atmospheric characteristics that tends to reduce the accuracy of regional weather forecast and therefore influencing the local industry including ocean liners. In this conference, we report a progress on customization of atmospheric transmission model suitable for direct solar irradiance measurement in the region. A large volume of direct solar irradiance and atmospheric variable data were collected over the period of 12 months in 2018. The data were obtained not only from the ground stations for low altitude, but also from the radiosonde measurement for high altitude. Initial analysis using MODTRAN showed some portions of the direct solar irradiance data that disagree with the predictions from the MODTRAN standard atmospheric models. Further in-depth study including sensitivity analysis were carried out and resulted in construction of a customized MODTRAN atmospheric model offering more accurate prediction to the measured direct solar irradiance data of the local area.