%0 Journal Article
%T The HelioClim Project: Surface Solar Irradiance Data for Climate Applications
%A Philippe Blanc
%A Beno£¿t Gschwind
%A Mireille Lef¨¨vre
%A Lucien Wald
%J Remote Sensing
%D 2011
%I MDPI AG
%R 10.3390/rs3020343
%X Meteosat satellite images are processed to yield values of the incoming surface solar irradiance (SSI), one of the Essential Climate Variables. Two HelioClim databases, HC-1 and HC-3, were constructed covering Europe, Africa and the Atlantic Ocean, and contain daily and monthly means of SSI. The HC-1 database spans from 1985 to 2005; HC£¿3 began in 2004 and is updated daily. Their quality and limitations in retrieving monthly means of SSI have been studied by a comparison between eleven stations offering long time-series of measurements. A good agreement was observed for each site: bias was less than 10£¿W/m2 in absolute value (5% in relative value) for HC-3. HC-1 offers a similar quality, though it underestimates the SSI for latitudes greater than 45¡ã and less than £¿45¡ã. Time-series running from 1985 to date can be created by concatenating the HC-1 and HC-3 values and could help in assessing SSI and its£¿changes.
%K solar radiation
%K solar irradiance
%K solar exposure
%K climate
%K Africa
%K Europe
%K Atlantic Ocean
%K remote sensing
%K long-term analysis
%K Meteosat
%U http://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/3/2/343