Theoretical prediction and validation of global horizontal solar irradiance for a tropical climate in India

Abstract

This paper aims to propose monthly models responsible for the theoretical evaluation of the global horizontal irradiance of a tropical region in India which is Sivagangai situated in Tamilnadu. The actual measured global horizontal irradiance hails from a 5MW solar power plant station located at Sivagangai in Tamilnadu. The data were monitored from May 2011 to April 2013. The theoretical assessment was conducted differently by employing a programming platform called Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Express. A graphical user interface was created using Visual Basic 2010 Express, which provided the evaluation of empirical parameters for model formulation such as daily sunshine duration (S), maximum possible sunshine hour duration (S0), extra terrestrial horizontal global irradiance (H0) and extra terrestrial direct normal irradiance (G0). The proposed regression models were validated by the significance of statistical indicators such as mean bias error, root mean square error and mean percentage error from the predicted and the actual values for the region considered. Comparison was made between the proposed monthly models and the existing normalized models for global horizontal irradiance evaluation.