Solar Power Generation
Considering the importance of scaling up various renewable energy technologies and the proper existing legal and regulatory framework the Government of Armenia has applied and received Grant from Climate Investment Funds Scaling-up Renewable Energy Program (SREP) in low income countries administered by International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) toward the cost of preparation of Utility-Scale Solar Power Project and currently applies part of proceeds for project preparation which includes solar resource assessment, carrying out feasibility studies, transaction advisory services, capacity building and other related activities.
The main reasons why Utility-Scale Solar Power Project introduced as one of the main components for SREP financing was the high solar resource and scaling up opportunity for Armenia.
The hired international consultant has already prepared the initial maps for different components of solar irradiation based on satellite data modeling a historical data available from 7 solar energy measuring stations belonging to Armenian hydro-meteorological services.
Daily average GHI indicator for most promising locations varies from 5 to 5,5 kWh. Annual GHI is greater than 1750kWh for most promising locations. The peak solar energy incident power on 1 sqm is 1250W. This high peak value is related to the high altitude and low air pollution levels.
For enhancing the precision of available data 4 ground based full meteorological stations have been installed in the locations where solar power plants are proposed to be built. The stations are equipped with the highest possible precision secondary standard class solar irradiation measuring equipment.
The accuracy of measurements is only 1 W/sqm.
Along with the solar irradiation and hydro-meteorological parameters other useful parameters such as aerosol optical depth and PV module surface temperature are also being measured which are important for correcting the satellite models and PV yield maps of the country.
Solar Resource Maps
From 2016 up to June 2017, “Armenia Renewable Resources and Energy Efficiency Fund” (R2E2) (the Fund) has been implementing the assessment of solar potential of Armenia with the World Bank assistance as a result of which currently we have solar maps of Armenia (DHI, DNI, GHI and Yield) with high accuracy.
By joint decision of the Fund and the Ministry of Energy Infrastructures and Natural Resources of RoA, the subject maps shall be made fully public and will serve all the subjects operating in the solar energy sector to make more accurate investment decisions.
It should be stressed that within the scope of works, 4 up-to-date measurement stations have been procured with the help of which and per the Fund’s order, Spanish “Effergy” company, which has great reputation and experience in the given sectors, compared satellite data and retrieved the final accurate data. By means of applying special software packages and methods, Maps of Solar Potential of Armenia were developed. These maps are unique and with their accuracy surpass other available maps, since the satellite data for the past 17 years and high accuracy measurements serve basis for developing these maps.
The solar potential maps and the final report of “Effergy” may be found by the following links.
Solar resource assessment for PV applications in Armenia
Production of Validated Solar Atlas
Selection of Suitable Sites for PV development
