Solar Irradiance Forecast Based on Cloud Movement Prediction

Aleksander Radovan, Viktor Šunde, Danijel Kučak and Željko Ban
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Aleksander Radovan: BISS Ltd., 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
Viktor Šunde: Department of Electric Machines, Drives and Automation, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
Danijel Kučak: Department of Software Engineering, Algebra University College, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
Željko Ban: Department of Control and Computer Engineering, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 13, 1-25

Abstract: Solar energy production based on a photovoltaic system is closely related to solar irradiance. Therefore, the planning of production is based on the prediction of solar irradiance. The optimal use of different energy storage systems requires an accurate prediction of solar irradiation with at least an hourly time horizon. In this work, a solar irradiance prediction method is developed based on the prediction of solar shading by clouds. The method is based on determining the current cloud position and estimating the velocity from a sequence of multiple images taken with a 180-degree wide-angle camera with a resolution of 5 s. The cloud positions for the next hour interval are calculated from the estimated current cloud position and velocity. Based on the cloud position, the percentage of solar overshadowing by clouds is determined, i.e., the solar overshadowing curve for the next hour interval is calculated. The solar irradiance is determined by normalizing the percentage of the solar unshadowing curve to the mean value of the irradiance predicted by the hydrometeorological institute for that hourly interval. Image processing for cloud detection and localization is performed using a computer vision library and the Java programming language. The algorithm developed in this work leads to improved accuracy and resolution of irradiance prediction for the next hour interval. The predicted irradiance curve can be used as a predicted reference for solar energy production in energy storage system optimization.

Keywords: solar irradiance prediction; cloud movement; sky image processing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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