ASSESSMENT OF THE ACCURACY OF GENERATED METEOROLOGICAL DATA FOR USE IN SOLAR-ENERGY SIMULATION STUDIES

Simulations provide the only practical method for designing solar energy systems. Meteorological data are needed to drive the simulations. However, long-term meteorological data (e.g., 20 years) are not available in most locations so simulations often rely on a reduced set of data or data which have been synthesized with statistical models. Even in locations in which long-term data records exist, the computational requirements of using these data for design purposes is significant so a reduced set of data (e.g., 1 year) is generally used. This study investigates the accuracy of using reduced and synthesized sets of meteorological models for solar applications. The accuracy estimates are made relative to estimates determined with over 20 years of hourly meteorological records.