ESTIMATION OF GROUND ALBEDO BY GMS IMAGES FOR SOLAR IRRADIATION MONITORING

Recently, the utilization of cloud images obtained by Geostationary Me teorological Satellite (GMS) has been proposed by several organization s for solar irradiation monitoring [1,2]. In order to exactly estimate the irradiation at ground-level by the images, it must be noted that the images are affected by seasonal and local variations, especially c aused by ground albedo. Nowadays, the computations of the albedo are p erformed by using a time series of the images. Example maps of the alb edo are also given for each season. In addition, a new rule of estimat ing the irradiation by using the albedo is proposed. Using this new me thod, the annual- and seasonal-integrated global irradiation can be es timated with good accuracy in spite of ground conditions.