🔎 Measuring irradiance data
The positioning of the irradiance meter relative to the solar panels is crucial in ensuring that you are going to be collecting measurements correctly. To accurately measuring the Global Tilted Irradiance (GTI), the sensor must be placed on the same plane as the panels during the inspection. If the sensor is not positioned correctly, the irradiance data you will be collecting will not be correct.
In the example below you will see that the meter is placed on the structure of the panels to ensure it is on the same plane as the solar panels. This means that even if you are working on single-axis trackers, the irradiance meter will follow the inclination of the panels ensuring the accuracy of your measurements. Additionally, you are avoiding putting the sensor directly on the panels and creating any artificial shading.
❗️ The minimum required frequency for recording measurements is 15 minutes
Correctly positioned irradiance meter:
Incorrectly positioned irradiance meter:
📤 Uploading your weather data
Once you are back from the field you will need to upload the weather data that you have captured to the SIDEREAL Fuse platform. This can be done by navigating to the operation and clicking on the Weather Data button on the top right (shown below).
After this you will need to make the appropriate choice on where to upload the data. You can either upload it as a handheld device, or as pyranometer data, highlighted with the green boxes below. Once you have made your choice, you can use Import the data with the button highlighted in pink.
Once you have chosen the data you would like to import, you will need to assign the correct headers for each of the data columns and preparing the data.
Here's how to prepare the data:
Unselect the first row of data that contains the titles in the file, this can be done with the checkbox highlighted in red.
Assign the correct titles to your data: Highlighted in orange is an example of how to do this correctly making sure that you give the Global Tilted Irradiance (GTI) the title of Irradiance.
Select the correct delimiter of the data highlighted in blue.
Finally, once you have checked the steps above are correct you can finalise and import the data but using the Import Weather Data button highlighted in green.
❗️Things to watch out for:
Date & Time vs. Timestamp: A timestamp contains all date and time information in one cell ie. 10:05:00 17:01:2022. Make sure that you select timestamp only when this is the case, if they date and time are in 2 separate cells, they should be labelled Date & Time respectively as shown in the example above.
The best format to submit a Date is to have it in the following format: DD.MM.YY . This means that to submit the first of April 2022 it should be formatted like 01.04.22.
The irradiance data that you are labelling is the GTI (Global Tilted Irradiance)
For the upload to succeed there must be at least Date & Time (or Timestamp) and Irradiance data.
Here is a link to the sensor that we recommend.