Spatial Mapping of Solar Potential of Ghana Using Geographic Information Systems
Sebastian BOTSYO, John AYER
Ghana is endowed with significant amounts of renewable energy resources, that when fully exploited, can contribute to mitigating the power crisis facing the country as well as reducing the rates of forest depletion and CO2 emissions.Even though solar energy potential in Ghanais estimated at 35 EJ,its exploitation is low.(Mensahet al., 2017)For the utilization of a solar energy potential and system, knowledge about the solar irradiation potential in every location isrequired. In addition, a solar energy map is practicable for further evaluation ofthe renewable energy option and strategic planning, such as for site location(Joshi, 2013).This research therefore, aimed at developing solar energypotentialmap for the exploitation of solar energy to support other power sources to meet the growing demand of electricity in Ghana.The solar potential mapwas developed using Google Earth Engine(GEE). The Landsat 8 OLI/TIRS satellite data was used to generate the Global Horizontal Irradiance (GHI)over the various regions.The Dark Object Subtraction methodwasused in computing the solar radiation from Landsat 8 and had a minimum and maximum of about 1.5 kWh/m2and 7 kWh/m2respectively from 2014 to 2018. A Time series analysis was performed on the solar radiation monthly data for each year from 2014 to 2018. This was to find out the trend of increase and decrease in solar radiation over the months in the various years.The Surface Albedo was also calculated for the regions to know the general reflectivity of solar radiations over the areas.The mean of the solar radiation was computed from 2014 to 2018 as well as that of the Land Surface Temperature (LST)and Surface Albedo.The derived solar potential showed that the upper part of Ghana had a higher potential for solar radiation than that of the lower regions. The Northern Region had a very high solar potential, followed by the Upper East and Upper West Region. Volta Region showed a fairly minimum solar potential values.
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