Empirical models for the correlation of global solar radiation under Malaysia environment

Abstract

This paper proposes a new mathematical model to estimate module temperature that has similar tropical climate such as Malaysia. The developed model was based on measured hourly global solar radiation, ambient and module temperature data of Malaysia (3.1°N and 101.7°E). Models were compared using coefficient correlation (r), coefficient of determination (r2), Mean Bias Error (MBE), Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) Mean Percentage Error (MPE), t-statistic (t-Stat) and F-test. Results show that, the proposed model gives the highest value of correlation coefficient r (0.881), coefficient of determination r2 (0.776), and give good result when considering statistical indicators i.e. low RMSE value (0.0382), low MBE value (0.00698), low MPE value (-0.00066). The t-statistic and F-test were used as best indicators and more effective for determining the model performance.