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SnowFogS

  • Contact:

    Jan Cermak

    Julia Fuchs

    Marina Zara

    Eva Pauli

    Babak Jahani

  • Funding:

    BMWK, Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action

  • Partner:

    Fraunhofer ISE, Freiburg (link: https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de)

  • Start Date:

    2021

  • End Date:

    2023

Project Summary

SnowFogS - Detection and Nowcasting of Fog and Snow for Photovoltaics Forecasting

Reliable forecasts of photovoltaics (PV) power are required for power marketing and grid operation. However, these forecasts are of low quality in many situations. In particular, the development of snow cover and fog is difficult to predict. The aim of this project is to improve PV forecasts in situations with fog or snow on PV installations. To this end, satellite-based detection and nowcasting, statistics-based very short-term forecasting, are to be improved and employed as a basis for better PV forecasts.

Project Overview

 

Julia Fuchs
Classification of a test scene over Europe from February 13, 2021, 1:00 p.m. after applying the fog and snow software into 8 classes (ice clouds, cirrus clouds, water clouds, fog and low clouds (fls), land, snow, water, unidentified).
Julia Fuchs
Fog and low stratus (FLS, gray) as a result of the ML model, January 14, 2022.

Project Contributions

Our contributions to the project:

  • Detection of fog and snow from satellite data using phyics-based techniques and machine learning
  • Nowcasting of fog dissipation based on environmental conditions using statistical techniques / machine learning

 

Publications & Resources

Title Link
ESA Land Surface Temperature Project - Key Documents & Publications Link
Journal Article - Remote Sensing (2023) Link
Journal Article - Remote Sensing (2019) Link
Journal Article - Atmosphere (2022) Link
Journal Article - Atmosphere (2024) Link
EGU Abstract - Precipitation Suppression in Stratocumulus (2024) Link
Pauli et al. (2021) - EGU Abstract Link
Pauli et al. (2022) - EGU Abstract Link
Pauli et al. (2023) - EGU Abstract Link

 

Project Partner

  • Fraunhofer-Institut für Solare Energiesysteme (ISE)
  • Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT)
  • energy & meteo systems GmbH (emsys)
  • TenneT TSO GmbH (TenneT)
  • Amprion GmbH (Amprion)
  • PSIORI GmbH (PSIORI)