New temperature-based models for reliable prediction of monthly mean daily global solar radiation

Abstract

Most third-world locations have a record of very limited types of measured meteorological parameters. In such locations, reliable single-parameter models are disposed to have more applications than the multi-parameter models when solar energy is needed as an explicit function. This fact motivated the effort in this work to improve empirical modeling of solar energy in terms of temperature as the sole predictor. Building on the notion of Hargreaves and Samani that daily solar radiation can sufficiently be modeled empirically in terms of daily Tmin and Tmax, new temperature-based models for daily solar radiation are proposed. The uniqueness of the proposed models is rooted on the novel inclusion of interactions of Tmin and Tmax. The proposed models were calibrated and validated for locations in Southern Nigeria and shown to be more statistically reliable for the studied area than the other single-parameter models that are based on air temperature as the sole predictor. The included interactions of Tmin and Tmax are further verified through ANOVA to improve predictive accuracy.