Calculating Angle Of Incidence Solar Panel

Solar panels work well in the winter but you will typically see a dip in total energy production during particularly bad winters due to snow covering your panels and reducing their power output.

Calculating angle of incidence solar panel.

Both vectors are normalized and thus the solar angle of incidence on a tilted surface is obtained by calculating the scalar multiplication of these two vectors. The calculator shows the degrees from vertical. Select the town or city nearest where you live. The vectors s and n become.

Select your country from the list. If you have selected america or canada select your state or province. Whatever your latitude is you can subtract 15 from it to calculate the angle for summer. S cosas cosys sinas cosys sinys t n cosat sinyt sinat sinyt cosyt t.

Hit the calculate solar position button. North 0 east 90 south 180 west 270 degree. The result for chicago is 90 42 23 25. Calculates a table of changes in the solar elevation and azimuth angles for a day and draws the chart.

Tilt the panels to your latitude. Similarly you can calculate the angle for winter by adding 15. Azimuth in degrees clockwise from north. In this way at noon the panels will be perfectly perpendicular to the sun s rays.

Both of these angles require latitude degrees. Solar declination in degrees with positive to the north. Once the calculations are complete you may use your browser s print function to obtain a hardcopy of the results. The calculator will then show the optimum angle for the solar panel.

A comparison of data in two us cities has been completed to exhibit the importance of a solar pv array s tilt angle. One way to counteract winter production dips is to install your panels at a lower angle than your latitude. Tilt the panels to your latitude minus 15. Results are given in the following units.

As a general rule of thumb energy output can be optimized by adding 15 degrees to a site s latitude in the winter and subtracting 15 degrees to a site s latitude in the summer. There are two methods for calculating the tilt angle for solar panels. Tilt the panels to your latitude plus 15. To get maximum energy efficiency during the winter solstice the solar panels in chicago must face south and be tilted 65 90 25.

Tilt the panels to your latitude. Equation of time in minutes of time.