Probabilistic Forecast of All-Sky Solar Radiation Using Enhanced WRF-Solar: Preprint

Conference · Wed Sep 09 04:00:00 EDT 2020

OSTI ID:1669593

Kim, Ju-Hye; Jimenez, Pedro A.; Dudhia, Jimy; Yang, Jaemo; Sengupta, Manajit; Xie, Yu

This study presents enhancements of the Weather Research and Forecasting model with solar extensions (WRF-Solar) to provide probabilistic forecasts of solar radiation. Our approach builds ensemble WRF-Solar runs by introducing stochastic perturbations of variables that produce the largest uncertainties in predicting surface irradiance and clouds. The key variables are identified using tangent linear sensitivity analysis of six physics packages responsible for all-sky irradiance variability. An optimal strategy to stochastically perturb the selected variables is developed and applied to WRF-Solar to generate ensemble members for day-ahead solar prediction. The National Solar Radiation Database (NSRDB) is used to validate the ensemble forecast at arbitrary locations on the model grid. Preliminary results indicate that the proposed technique can potentially produce WRF-Solar ensembles providing reliable information of solar prediction uncertainty. This study describes the implemented methodology and initial results as well as future research to improve ensemble-based probabilistic forecasts with WRF-Solar.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Solar Energy Technologies Office (EE-4S)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 1669593
• Report Number(s): NREL/CP-5D00-77693; MainId:30608; UUID:1ddb653b-e421-4e4f-85d9-99af44f853df; MainAdminID:17445
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

SOLAR ENERGY
WRF
Weather Research and Forecasting model
all-sky
forecasting
probabilistic
radiation
solar