Data sets currently available on SRRL TSR web site
- Daily plots and raw data files, are available from August 28, 2009 to July 16, 2012.
- Solar Calendars, are available from August 2009 to July 2012.
- Instrument history and meta data.
A Thermopile Shadowband Radiometer (TSR) offers a low cost option of measuring solar radiation resources for renewable energy applications. The TSR is a thermopile-based instrument that measures the global and diffuse solar irradiance. The control and data acquisition system computes the corresponding direct normal solar irradiance based on the geographic location of the TSR and the time of the data collection events.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has obtained three TSRs from Yankee Environmental Systems on August 2009 for evaluation. These instruments were installed at the Solar Radiation Research Laboratory (SRRL). The long-term performance of the TSR will be compared to traditional thermopile-based radiometers and the Irradiance Inc RSR located at SRRL.
By design, the TSRs offer the potential advantages of lower maintenance and calibration costs because they use a single instrument with a diffuser for determining the direct, diffuse, and global solar irradiance rather than up to three radiometers with larger optical surfaces, more complex support equipment, or more maintenance-intensive support equipment.