Solar Power Forecasting (SOLARFOR)
The share of the global energy production coming from solar power is increasing, and forecasts of the solar power is the key for a successful integration of solar power into the existing electricity grid. SOLARFOR (Solar Power Forecasting) is a flexible tool for online prediction of the solar power production coming from eg. PV (photo-voltaic) based power systems. The tool can be used both to deliver forecasts for single solar power plant, and to deliver forecast for a large geographical region with a huge number of both small and larger solar power installations.
SOLARFOR is among the most accurate tools on the market for solar power forecasting today. However, the uncertainty of the forecasts varies in time (for instance as a function of the cloud cover situation), and therefore SOLARFOR also offers reliable estimates of the uncertainty of the predictions. Reliable estimates of the uncertainty are crucial for knowing if a given the prediction is precise or not. It is well-known that estimates of the uncertainty are needed for obtaining optimal economical benefits of the forecasts.
SOLARFOR is focusing on the short term markets, and the horizon is typically up to, say, 72 hours, but it can be changed to accomplish other needs.
Characteristics
The background for the leading performance of SOLARFOR is a two stage method where first a statistical normalization of the solar power is obtained by using a smooth estimate of the clear sky solar power production at the plant. Then forecasts of the normalized solar power production is found using adaptively estimated time series models, which takes numerical weather predictions (NWPs) as input.
SOLARFOR is build on adaptive statistical models, and hence the system automatically calibrates to the actual situation like the dirtiness of the PV panels, etc.
Input to SOLARFOR
Depending on the configuration of SOLARFOR the following is taking into account when the system is used for a single solar power plant (see the section below for large scale solar power forecasting):
- Online measurements of the solar power production.
- Historical time series of solar power production.
- Meteorological forecasts.
- Calendar information.
- Geographical information.
Output from SOLARFOR
SOLARFOR is tailored to the need of the end-users. Typically, however, SOLARFOR is configured to deliver
- Short term online predictions (say 0-48 hour ahead) of the solar power production at a plant.
- Reliable confidence intervals for the predicted solar power production.
Large Scale (Regional) Solar Power Forecasting
Like for our tool for wind power prediction (WPPT) SOLARFOR can be used for predicting the solar power production in larger regions -- like for a state or the entire country. Like in the wind power prediction case it is not necessary to have online measurements from all solar power production plants. Depending on the climatic and geographic characteristics, only online measurements from only a small fraction of the plants is needed. The upscaling procedure in SOLARFOR needs, however, aggregated energy readings from all solar power plants in the region - but these readings need not to be online.
SOLARFOR Configuration Examples
The flexibility of SOLARFOR is almost identical to that of WPPT. This means that SOLARFOR can be used by the owner of a single plant, or by owners of several plants. The system can even be used by large scale TSO having no direct access to online measurements. For an illustration of various configuration examples we refer to the configuration examples described for WPPT (reference).
For more information please contact us.
E-mail: info ¤ enfor . dk | Phone: (+45) 45 350 350