Educational material

During 2002, the UO SRML began developing educational material on the use of solar radiation data. Our goal was to provide a basic understanding of the solar resource and the uses of solar radiation data. We have structured this section so that an overview of the information is be linked to more detailed, technical explanations.

Understanding the solar resource

Prior to using solar data it is important to understand the terminology of solar resource assessment and the geometry that relates the incoming solar radiation to the collector. The section on solar radiation basics provides this fundamental information. Information on modeling and correlations of the solar resource can be found in PDF files that are part of our Pacific Northwest Solar Radiation Data book.

Currently available resources

A series of solar electric lesson plans for high school science students have been produced, and are available now for teachers to download.

The Pacific Northwest Solar Radiation Data book contains considerable information about solar radiation data, models used to manipulate the data, and the utility of long-term solar radiation data. The book is in .PDF format, readable with Adobe Acrobat.

Answers to a few frequently asked questions are available. We'll be adding to our FAQ as we hear from more of you.

You may find the glossary on our site to be helpful as you encounter the specialized vocabulary of solar radiation. Our glossary is heavily based on one developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), who also have many other solar radiation resources on their Web site. We'll be enhancing our glossary with terms, definitions, and examples that are specifically tailored to the work that we do.

For more information

Information about instruments used to collect solar radiation data, and about our monitoring stations, is found in the solar data section of this site.

The software tools section contains information relevant to the use of the software.

Besides the above-mentioned solar radiation data book, there are technical papers and newsletters available on our Web site's publications page.

Finally, we have compiled a list of useful links to resources and information on other Web sites.