SolarAnywhere API
Create robust web-based or desktop applications that directly access the SolarAnywhere irradiance and weather data, or estimate PV system energy production with the SolarAnywhere API.
Irradiance Data
The SolarAnywhere weather data API can retrieve irradiance, wind, and temperature data in CSV format or as a DataSet via a SOAP API. In addition to the time series data that provides direct normal irradiance (DNI), global horizontal irradiance (GHI), and diffuse horizontal irradiance (DIF) at regular time intervals, applications can request annual totals and typical month data, as well as wind and temperature data.
To access the weather data, applications provide the latitude and longitude of the location for which data is to be retrieved, along with the starting and ending time of the period for the data. The spatial and temporal resolution of the data to be returned can also be specified.
Photovoltaic System Simulation
In addition to providing irradiance and weather data, SolarAnywhere can be used to simulate PV system energy production through a set of RESTful web services known as PVSimulator. The PV simulation tools in SolarAnywhere support a variety of PV project analyses, from estimating long-term power generation potential at a single project location, to forecasting production and variability for a fleet of PV systems.
Rather than relying on a monolithic simulation model, PVSimulator supports pluggable components for irradiance data providers, plane of array irradiance (POAI) calculations, module power output models, and inverter output. Current irradiance data sources include SolarAnywhere, TMY1 and TMY3, or user-specified data. POAI calculations are made using the Perez irradiance model, and Simplified PVFORM and Clean Power Estimator models are available for module power output calculations.
When using the basic simulation service, the client application submits a request containing an XML description of simulation options along with one or more energy system sites. If multiple sites are specified, the results will represent the sum of the energy production from all sites.
Simulation options include such things as an optional list of intermediate energy calculation results, the desired time period format, the azimuth reference used, and the solar obstruction angle spacing. Each energy system site consists of a location, specified using latitude and longitude or ZIP code, and one or more energy systems. The energy system structure allows client applications to specify multiple subsystems, each with separate lists of inverters and arrays, and separate system losses. Each array, in turn, can have its own module specifications, array orientation, and solar obstructions. All of these factors are taken into account during the energy simulation.
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