Solar Energy Forecasting and Resource Assessment

Book excerpt: Solar Energy Forecasting and Resource Assessment is a vital text for solar energy professionals, addressing a critical gap in the core literature of the field. As major barriers to solar energy implementation, such as materials cost and low conversion efficiency, continue to fall, issues of intermittency and reliability have come to the fore. Scrutiny from solar project developers and their financiers on the accuracy of long-term resource projections and grid operators' concerns about variable short-term power generation have made the field of solar forecasting and resource assessment pivotally important. This volume provides an authoritative voice on the topic, incorporating contributions from an internationally recognized group of top authors from both industry and academia, focused on providing information from underlying scientific fundamentals to practical applications and emphasizing the latest technological developments driving this discipline forward. - The only reference dedicated to forecasting and assessing solar resources enables a complete understanding of the state of the art from the world's most renowned experts. - Demonstrates how to derive reliable data on solar resource availability and variability at specific locations to support accurate prediction of solar plant performance and attendant financial analysis. - Provides cutting-edge information on recent advances in solar forecasting through monitoring, satellite and ground remote sensing, and numerical weather prediction.