Does solar radiation intermittency predict future photovoltaic reliability?

Using both satellite data and climate model outputs, we characterize solar radiation intermittency to assess future photovoltaic reliability.

Why does solar power show an intermittency in timescale?

Solar power will therefore show an intermittency in timescale of hours up to months due to these diurnal and seasonal cycles, adversely affecting the stability and reliability of power grids 7.

How does climate affect solar power reliability?

As can be seen in Fig. 1, the K distributions for larger mean values (denoted as μ and also referred to as the mean clearness index) tend to have longer left tails, which are associated with the weaker solar radiation and lower power generation. Fig. 1: Examples of climate impacts on solar radiation and photovoltaic power reliability.

Can reliability analysis account for the mean and intermittency of solar inputs?

Our results highlight how reliability analysis must account simultaneously for the mean and intermittency of solar inputs when assessing the impacts of climate change on photovoltaics. The intermittency of solar resources is one of the primary challenges for the large-scale integration of the renewable energy.

Does aggregation affect the intermittency of solar power generation?

The aim of this article is to address the fundamental scientific question on how the intermittency of solar power generation is affected by aggregation, which is of great interest in the wider power and energy community and would have profound impacts on the solar energy integration into the energy supply and Net-Zero Implementation.

Does solar radiation reduce intermittency?

As expected, solar radiation with ” reduced variability has smaller LOLP, showing that increased storage can be used to mitigate the intermittencys impacts in ’ most parts of the world. However, this may not be sufficient in a few regions such as the Middle East (see Supplementary Fig. 11).