Estimation of Aerosol-Corrected Surface Solar Irradiance at Local Incidence Angle over Different Physiographic Subdivisions of India and Adjoining Areas Using MODIS and SRTM Data

Abstract

AbstractSurface solar irradiance is considered as an important component of the surface radiation budget and constitutes one of the essential climate variables. In the present study, clear-sky instantaneous solar irradiance was estimated over 15 physiographic regions of India during January. Dewpoint temperature profiles were extracted from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument onboard the Aqua satellite to calculate actual vapor pressure following Clausius–Clapeyron equation, which was further used in the Zillman parameterization for solar irradiance. The effect of terrain slope and aspect on direct radiation was taken into account by modifying the parameterized incoming shortwave flux by introducing the local incidence angle. A significant positive correlation was found between terrain-corrected MODIS irradiance and measured radiation data but the RMSE was very high (187 W m−2). Further, the effect of aerosol extinction was introduced by multiplying the terrain-corrected flux by a transmission factor obtained from satellite-derived aerosol optical depth and Ångström exponent. Due to the inclusion of the aerosol transmittance, the correlation was significantly improved (R2 = 0.84) and RMSE was reduced (31 W m−2). Further the effect of surface orientation on surface irradiance was evaluated on six hilly subdivisions. A large variation in the flux (135 to 161 W m−2) was noticed among different aspect classes. The variability was highest in the Eastern Himalayas subdivision (>250 W m−2) and was a minimum in the Eastern Hills subdivision (<28 W m−2). In absence of ground radiation data in hills, Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2), was used for validation of model output but it performed poorly and got saturated at higher surface irradiance values.