A universal model for solar radiation exergy accounting: Case study of Tunisia

The global solar radiation is the origin for all environmental processes on the earth and the majority of energy sources are derived from it. The data of solar radiation are required for the design and the study of solar application systems. The more important is the quality of the solar radiation which is defined by the maximum work can be provided by the solar radiation. This quality is measured by the exergy content of a solar radiation. In the present work, a universal pattern has been built to provide a prediction of solar exergy dependently to the geographic location. Fitting models have been developed for exergy account depending on geographic location, based on the linear, quadratic, cubic, logarithmic, exponential, power regression. The Petela model is adopted from literature for exergetic efficiency accounting of solar radiation. The global solar radiation according to ASHRAE model is expressed dependently of the cosine of zenith angle. The developed model is applied on Tunisia regions to predict exergy solar potential. The studied regions are classified regarding the exergy account, high, medium and low solar exergy locations. Results show that generally the solar radiation shows a low degree of exergy content, about 7% of difference.