What is it about?
In India, the production of solar power is increasing rapidly. In this work we used data from global climate models to assess how the amount of solar radiation will change during the ongoing century. According to the climate models, solar radiation is likely to decline by a few percent during the next few decades. Nonetheless, if global climate policy is successful, during the second half of this century solar radiation will recover close to the level that prevailed in the late-20th century. Changes in solar radiation are closely related to the temporal evolution of dimming due to aerosol particles and water vapour.
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Why is it important?
India plans to increase its solar power capacity strongly in the coming years and decades. It is therefore essential to know that climate models project only a minor deterioration in the conditions for solar energy production. Evidently, other factors such as the price of electricity, the costs of solar energy production and the vigour of greenhouse gas emission reductions determine the profitability of solar energy.
Perspectives
According to the climate models, the densely populated areas in Northern India will experience the strongest decrease in the solar energy resources during the coming decades. This is also the area where a lot of energy is needed. As aerosols have a negative effect on both health and solar energy production, reducing the aerosol pollution would be beneficial from many points of view.
Kimmo Ruosteenoja
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Future Changes in Incident Surface Solar Radiation and Contributing Factors in India in CMIP5 Climate Model Simulations, Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, January 2019, American Meteorological Society,
DOI: 10.1175/jamc-d-18-0013.1.
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