Calculation of solar radiation atmospheric absorption with different H2O spectral line data banks

A comparison of the atmospheric absorption calculated with different data banks of water vapour absorption lines is made. The HITRAN database, Barber-Tennyson line list (BT2), calculation of Partridge and Schwenke (PS) are considered. The contribution of H2O lines, absent in HITRAN, to the atmospheric transmission, calculated with 10 cm−1 spectral resolution in the 10 000-20 000 cm−1 spectral region is up to 1.5% for a vertical path and 4% for a solar zenith angle of 70 deg. The highest difference is observed in the 940 nm band. The incoming fluxes of solar radiation, measured by a rotating solar spectroradiometer, were modeled with BT2 and HITRAN database. The difference between measured and calculated fluxes does not exceed the instrumental uncertainties.