Researchers at Hungary's HUN-REN Research Centre for Astronomy and Earth Sciences have investigated the impact of Saharan dust storm events on PV power generation in Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, and Greece and have found that these events may reduce electricity yield by up to 50%.
The research team analyzed, in particular, the effects of Saharan dust storm events that occurred from 2019 to 2023 on PV power generation in these five southern European countries by using day-ahead forecast data from the Transparency Platform of the European Network of Transmission System Operators (Entso-E).
The scientists also used the Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA-2) reanalysis dataset provided by the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data Information Services Center to measure irradiance, cloud reflectance, and atmospheric dust load.
Furthermore, they utilized satellite measurements to assess the percentage of cloud cover and cloud top temperature, as well as hourly irradiance data from Copernicus CAMS v4.6, a state-of-the-art high-resolution European emission inventory for air quality modelling, to analyze cloud impact on irradiance for each period.
“Both hourly and daily data were used; daily values supported long-term analysis of dust impacts on PV production,” they explained. “Intense dust events were studied using hourly dust mass data, air mass trajectories, synoptic conditions, satellite aerosol profiles, and model forecasts to assess their effects.”
Based on this analysis, the academics found that Saharan dust events lead to a “monotonic” decrease in the percentage of PV power production with increasing mass column concentrations of Saharan dust across all five countries considered, with the average reduction being 25-40%.
They also ascertained that, when dust levels were extremely high, the country with the highest PV power generation loss was Greece, with an average of 20.1–40.9%, followed by France with 4.4–40.5%, Italy with 13.9–36.8%, Portugal with 10.1–29.3%, and Spain with 16.3–19.8%.
The scientists warned that real Saharan dust events may easily exceed these estimates. They explained, in fact, that the current day-ahead PV forecasts are often inaccurate when it comes to assessing these complex events.
“Specifically, elevated dust conditions led to consistent underestimations (up to −15%) in Portugal and Spain and overestimations (up to +10%) in Italy and Greece,” they emphasized. “These inaccuracies underline the urgent need for forecasting improvements that incorporate advanced aerosol-cloud-radiation interactions and real-time dust monitoring.”
Their findings are available in the paper “The shadow of the wind: the impact of Saharan dust on photovoltaic power generation in the Mediterranean,” published in Renewable Energy. “Given the anticipated increase in frequency and intensity of Saharan dust events under climate change scenarios, this study strongly emphasizes integrating dust-related uncertainties into renewable energy planning.”
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