3TIER, the company in renewable energy information services, today announced that its complete suite of solar prospecting and assessment products is now available throughout India. The products are based on 3TIER’s proprietary solar dataset, which is the most advanced and accurate solar dataset that exists for India. The products enable project developers to quantify the long-term availability and variability of solar resources with or without observational data.
"As solar energy development in India accelerates, 3TIER has the state-of-the-art products and expertise developers need to make optimal decisions,” said Nikhilesh Singh, managing director of 3TIER’s Bangalore office. “While much of India enjoys good solar resources, seasonal variability is significant, and 3TIER can help developers determine which sites are truly exceptional."
3TIER's solar dataset, which is based on satellite image processing, provides 3 to 30 times greater resolution than any other dataset for India. It is also based on a longer and more current timeframe than other datasets, using hourly satellite images from January 1999 through February 2010. The process accounts for turbidity caused by pollution, water vapor, and other particulate matter, and it accurately records seasonal effects of monsoon activity. The dataset has been rigorously validated and includes hourly values for Global Horizontal Irradiance (GHI), Direct Normal Irradiance (DNI) and Diffuse Horizontal Irradiance (DHI). The dataset is global in scope, enabling consistent analysis anywhere in the world.
3TIER has been operating its Bangalore office since 2008 and is currently working with many of the largest solar energy developers in India.
3TIER's Solar Prospecting Tools, an early-stage siting product, provides instant and unlimited online access to annual and monthly GHI, DNI and DIF variability for all of India, as well as several other regions worldwide. 3TIER also provides this information in the form of GIS data layers, facilitating efficient broad scale development planning. The entire 11-year hourly time series is also available for virtually any location and can be uploaded into many different software packages for analysis.
3TIER’s FullView Assessment products provide a more in-depth analysis of the solar resource and include data on other atmospheric factors, such as variations in temperature and wind speed, which have a significant impact on power production. These products can also reduce error and uncertainty by correcting bias within the dataset based on any available onsite observational data.
"A year of observational data simply doesn’t provide enough information or context to make a prudent investment in a solar project," said Kenneth Westrick, founder and CEO of 3TIER. "3TIER's solar products enable developers and financiers to understand the long-term characteristics of the solar resource, as well as all the factors that will impact production over the life of the project, putting the project on a solid financial foundation."