Evaluation and Correction of Solar Irradiance in Somaliland Using Ground Measurements and Global Reanalysis Products

Properly understanding solar irradiance can help accurately quantify the solar energy resource and guide sustainable development projects, particularly where measured solar data are scarce or suffer from detrimental data quality issues. This study aims to assess and improve solar global horizontal irradiance (GHI) data from a diverse range of global reanalysis datasets by utilizing measured data from two ground weather stations located in Somaliland. A comprehensive evaluation framework is employed, combining various statistical and regression error metrics, whereas bias correction methods are implemented. The comparative study covers several analytical facets such as the hourly, daily and monthly data analysis before and after correction along with analyzing the seasonal variations, clear-sky and all-sky conditions. The analysis revealed pattern of an overall underestimation of GHI with varying degrees of accuracy in the estimated GHI datasets before and after correction. The annual ranges for rMBE, rMAE, rRMSE and R