Introduction

Ground measured solar irradiance data is critical for benchmarking solar radiation products, modeling climate processes, and understanding the Earth’s radiation budget. However, due to high costs and maintenance requirements, there are only a few hundred high-quality stations globally. Partly due to the scarcity and even more so due to a lack of an overview, it has historically been difficult to determine if and where there is a nearby solar irradiance monitoring station. To address this, this site provides an overview of multi-component solar irradiance monitoring stations worldwide and supporting metadata.

A complete list of stations and metadata can be found in the station catalog.

To find the nearest station to a point of interest, check out the interactive map below. Note that it is possible to click on a station icon to get the station name and country.

Map backgrounds

When zooming in on a specific station, consider switching to the satellite image or annual irradiance backgrounds (top right corner).

Make this Notebook Trusted to load map: File -> Trust Notebook

Acknowledgements

Solar irradiance map backgrounds were obtained from the Global Solar Atlas 2.0, a free, web-based application developed and operated by Solargis s.r.o. on behalf of the World Bank Group, utilizing Solargis data, with funding provided by the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP). For additional information see https://globalsolaratlas.info.