Spatial disaggregation of satellite-derived irradiance using a high-resolution digital elevation model

Downscaling of the Meteosat-derived solar radiation (∼5 km grid resolution) is based on decomposing the global irradiance and correcting the systematic bias of its components using the elevation and horizon shadowing that are derived from the SRTM-3 digital elevation model (3 arc sec resolution). The procedure first applies the elevation correction based on the difference between coarse and high spatial resolution. Global irradiance is split into direct, diffuse circumsolar and diffuse isotropic components using statistical models, and then corrections due to terrain shading and sky-view fraction are applied. The effect of reflected irradiance is analysed only in the theoretical section. The method was applied in the eastern Andalusia, Spain, and the validation was carried out for 22 days on April, July and December 2006 comparing 15-min estimates of the satellite-derived solar irradiance and observations from nine ground stations. Overall, the corrections of the satellite estimates in the studied region strongly reduced the mean bias of the estimates for clear and cloudy days from roughly 2.3% to 0.4%.