Glare prediction of solar PV system in airport environment: A scenario analysis of material, tilt and orientation

Abstract

The application of solar PV is suitable in airport areas for energy generation due to the availability of vast open spaces. At the same time, there is possibility of glare from solar PV array which may affect the visibility of pilots and air traffic controllers. This paper attempts to perform glare assessment for conceptual solar PV system located in an airport of India using ForgeSolar software under four different scenarios. These four scenarios are solar PV modules with smooth glass, smooth glass with anti-reflective coating (ARC), light textured glass with ARC and different tilt & orientation angles respectively. The location of the proposed site, details of solar PV array and characteristics of observers are provided. The occurrence and duration of glare for each scenario is obtained from the software. The impact of glare is assessed based on solar glare standard set by Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Among the studied scenarios, safe value of glare is obtained in Scenario 4 only at specific values of tilt and orientation angle. A tilt angle of 15 degrees and orientation angle of 135 degrees is the suitable value with 99.1 % of theoretical energy output. It is observed that the yellow glare impact on ATC reduced in the descending order of Scenario 1 (2122 min), Scenario 2 (296 min) and Scenario 3 (0 min). It is concluded that proper selection of tilt and orientation angle of solar PV array aids in achieving zero minutes of glare for airport conditions.