Photovoltaics

Since 2000, the UO SRML has monitored photovoltaic (PV) systems as well as solar radiation at a number of locations. This page brings together the PV information available on our Website. From here, you can visit pages containing: PV shade analysis forms, contour plots showing PV performance versus tilt and orientation, a downloadable Excel Add-in that calculates solar angles and estimates PV system performance, and many other useful pages.

Measurements taken of solar electric systems and information about the PV systems monitored are found on the PV data page. Analysis of PV system performance is available on the PV system analysis page or in papers published on PV system performance.

For more information

Shade analysis forms, used to help find the best (least shaded) location for solar electric systems, and to better estimate the annual system output, are available for these Oregon cities: Astoria, Burns, Eugene, Medford, North Bend, Pendleton, Portland, Redmond, and Salem.
Contour plots showing the effect of tilt and orientation on annual solar electric system perfomance are available on this page for Astoria, Burns, Eugene, Medford, North Bend, Pendleton, Portland, Redmond, and Salem.
The photovoltaic performance calculator, PVWatts, is located on NREL's Web site. It calculates typical performance of solar electric arrays for more than 200 locations in the National Solar Radiation Database, given the system peak output and orientation.
Because actual PV performance will vary from year to year, we have created an Excel Add-in version of PVWatts that works with files formatted like UO SRML database files. You may download this program as shareware. For users of Typical Meteorological Year (TMY2) data files for sites in the National Solar Radiation Data Base, parsed tab separated ASCII files have been created that are consistent with the UO SRML format.
Information about the instruments used to collect solar radiation data, and about our monitoring stations, as well as access to the irradiance and PV performance data, is available in the solar data section of this site. A list of components that make up the PV systems being monitored can be found on the PV data page. Analysis of PV system performance is available on the PV system analysis page or in papers published on PV system performance.
Our data plotting program graphically depicts selected data, allowing you to see at a glance how irradiance values, solar cell performance, or meteorological readings varied on particular days at specified monitoring stations. You can also go to our monitoring stations page and select the PV system of interest to see a graph of the latest analyzed data from that station.
In the section devoted to educational material, there are solar electric lesson plans describing how solar cells and photovoltaic systems work. Also, see our newsletters page, where more recent issues of the Oregon Solar Energy Industries Association's newsletter, Solar Rising, often contain articles and pictures concerning PV systems.
Further information on solar radiation modeling is available in our Solar Radiation Data book and other publications on our Web site.