The Full Picture

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Space for solar energy
M. Schroedter-Homscheidt, Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) e.V;
P. Stackhouse, NASA Langley Research Center; F. Sarti, European Space Agency;
T. Ranchin, École des Mines de Paris
It is widely recognized, both scientifically and politically, that
the increase of atmospheric CO2 has led to the increased
speed of the greenhouse effect and, as such, warrants concern
with regards to climate change. Following the IPCC report in
2007, it is now clear that climate change is partly induced by
humans and the use of fossil fuels. Today, solar energy is receiv-
ing increasing attention as a clean and renewable energy
alternative to oil or coal. The future contribution of solar energy
to a sustainable energy supply strongly depends on its avail-
ability, in other words the solar resources.
The general expectation for the world’s solar energy market is a
sustained growth, based on incentives and preferential tariffs. During
this transition phase, with the solar energy market changing from
an idealistic/incentive driven market to a financially driven one,
investment assurance is necessary. This is provided by services in
the different phases of investment decision-making in the planning
stage, and in plant management during the operations phase. In both
phases, the spatial distribution of Global Earth Observation System
of Systems (GEOSS) information constitutes an advantage over
ground-measured data, and helps to develop sustainable
solar energy production.
Apart from these market segments, another emerging
and promising segment of the market is the load and
production forecasting for utilities. Because of liberal-
ized markets and the higher penetration of renewable
energies, an accurate load and production forecast is
necessary to secure energy supply with intermittent
renewable energy resources. For this segment, temper-
ature and irradiance, as the major environmental
influences on electricity demand and solar energy
production, become indispensable variables in fore-
casting.
Role of space technologies
Earth observation products and services have proven to
be helpful for the resource assessment, monitoring and
forecasting of fluctuating energy sources like solar
energy. Solar energy resources are currently assessed
mainly in situ and through satellite-based measure-
METEOSAT image
Clouds and aerosols as seen from the METEOSAT satellite series on 23 July 2004, 12:00 UTC
Source: Copyright DLR/EUMETSAT
S OCIETAL B ENEFIT A REAS – ENERGY