Effects of Aerosols and Clouds on the Levels of Surface Solar Radiation and Solar Energy in Cyprus

Ilias Fountoulakis,Ioannis-Panagiotis Raptis,Charalampos Kontoes,Kyriakoula Papachristopoulou,Stelios Kazadzis,Rodanthi-Elisavet Mamouri,Jonas Witthuhn,Patric Seifert,Antonis Gkikas,Johannes Buehl,Panagiotis Kosmopoulos,Anna Moustaka,Sebastian Bley,Diofantos G Hadjimitsis,Argyro Nisantzi

doi:10.3390/rs13122319

Abstract

Cyprus plans to drastically increase the share of renewable energy sources from 13.9% in 2020 to 22.9% in 2030. Solar energy can play a key role in the effort to fulfil this goal. The potential for production of solar energy over the island is much higher than most of European territory because of the low latitude of the island and the nearly cloudless summers. In this study, high quality and fine resolution satellite retrievals of aerosols and dust, from the newly developed MIDAS climatology, and information for clouds from CM SAF are used in order to quantify the effects of aerosols, dust, and clouds on the levels of surface solar radiation for 2004–2017 and the corresponding financial loss for different types of installations for the production of solar energy. Surface solar radiation climatology has also been developed based on the above information. Ground-based measurements were also incorporated to study the contribution of different species to the aerosol mixture and the effects of day-to-day variability of aerosols on SSR. Aerosols attenuate 5–10% of the annual global horizontal irradiation and 15–35% of the annual direct normal irradiation, while clouds attenuate 25–30% and 35–50% respectively. Dust is responsible for 30–50% of the overall attenuation by aerosols and is the main regulator of the variability of total aerosol. All-sky annual global horizontal irradiation increased significantly in the period of study by 2%, which was mainly attributed to changes in cloudiness.

Highlights

Introduction distributed under the terms andMitigation of climate change is one of the main challenges of humanity for the 21st century [1,2]
aerosol optical depth (AOD) was highest in MayAugust and lowest during January and December, which is similar to the pattern reported for other Eastern Mediterranean sites as well [26,27,88,89]
Small particles dominated the mixtures during December-February, which were usually linked with anthropogenic activities and combustion

Summary

Introduction

Mitigation of climate change is one of the main challenges of humanity for the 21st century [1,2]. It is currently accepted from the vast majority of the scientific community that since the mid 20th century global average temperature increases quickly mainly due to increasing anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations [3]. 2021, 13, 2319 in particular the combustion of fossil fuels contribute significantly to the anthropogenic emissions of GHGs as human welfare is inextricably linked to energy consumption. The global demand of energy increased monotonically in the last decades, leading to increased consumption of fossil fuels, and subsequently to increased emissions of GHGs [4]. In the frame of the Kyoto protocol (signed in 1997 and entered into force in 2005) and more recently in the frame of the Paris agreement (adopted in 2015 and entered into force in 2016), most nations committed to reduce GHG emissions

Methods

Results

Conclusion