Online Simulation Tools for Global Photovoltaic Performance: Purdue University Meteorological Tool (PUMET) and Bifacial Module Calculator (PUB)

The deployment of solar photovoltaics (PV) is an ongoing global effort; however, local climatic condition dictates the performance and reliability of a solar farm. Therefore, it is necessary to fully account for local meteorological information, for predicting and optimizing the long-term performance of PV. In this paper, we report two recently developed online simulation tools to facilitate this calculation. The first tool, Purdue University Meteorological Tool (PUMET), offers direct downloads of comprehensive worldwide PV-relevant meteorological data (e.g., irradiance, temperature, relative humidity) from a variety of public databases. The second tool, Purdue University Bifacial Module Calculator (PUB), can rigorously translate this meteorological dataset to the performance of a bifacial solar module installed at any arbitrary location in the world. The calculation employs an analytical view-factor based approach, which explicitly takes the self-shading loss of albedo light into account, and are based on recent publications on global performance of bifacial technology from the Purdue group. Both tools are publicly accessible through 1) PUMET: https://nanohub.org/tools/pumet and 2) PUB: https://nanohub.org/tools/pub, and can be integrated with other web-based tools (e.g. LCOE calculators) to make informed decisions regarding the financial viability of the bifacial PV technology.