Selection and implementation of aerosol data for the prediction of solar resource in United Arab Emirates

Armel Oumbe (1) , Hélène Bru (1) , Zhor Hassar (1) , Philippe Blanc (2) , Lucien Wald (2) , Antoine Fournier (3) , Dominique Goffe (3) , Matteo Chiesa (4) , Hosni Ghedira (4)

1 Total Gas & Power, R&D
2 CEP/Sophia
3 Bertin Technologies - Bertin Technologies
4 Masdar Institute of Science and Technology [Abu Dhabi]

In deserts, as the sky is often dusty and rarely cloudy, aerosols are the most critical atmospheric parameter for solar resource estimation. High differences between existing aerosol datasets, and low accuracies at solar irradiance estimates in Arabian Peninsula have been reported. This work is a part of a process of developing a tool for irradiance estimation accounting correctly for aerosols. As hourly irradiances are the focus, only intra-day resolved aerosol data are of interest. The paper validates the MACC (re-analysis model) derived aerosol optical depth in United Arab Emirates, discusses its accuracy compared with that of MATCH (chemical transport model), evaluates the potential error on global and direct normal irradiances due to the observed error on aerosol optical depth, and then proposes an algorithm for implementation of MACC partial aerosol optical depths in the libRadTran radiative transfer model.

Mots clés: aerosol optical depth; direct normal irradiance; global horizontal irradiance; radiative transfer

Domaines: Energétique; Océan, Atmosphère

Armel Oumbe, Hélène Bru, Zhor Hassar, Philippe Blanc, Lucien Wald, et al.. Selection and implementation of aerosol data for the prediction of solar resource in United Arab Emirates. SolarPACES 2012, Sep 2012, Marrakech, Morocco. USBKey Paper#22240. ⟨hal-00779749⟩