Solar Energy Vol. 45, No. 6, pp. 353-363, 1990 003&092x/90 $3.00 + .

oo
Printed in the U.S.A. Copyright 0 1990 Pergamon Press plc

SOLAR RADIATION ON MARS

JOSEPH APPELBAUM* and DENNISJ. FLOOD

National Aeronauticsand SpaceAdministration,LewisResearchCenter,Cleveland,OH 44135,U.S.A.
Abstract-Detailed information on solar radiation characteristics on Mars are necessary for effective design
of future planned solar energy systems operating on the surface of Mars. In this paper we present a procedure
and solar radiation related data from which the diurnally, hourly and daily variation of the global, direct
beam and diffuse insolation on Mars are calculated. The radiation data are based on measured optical depth
of the Martian atmospherederivedfrom imagestakenof the sunwith a specialdiodeon the Vikingcameras;
and computation basedon multiple wavelengthand multiple scatteringof the solarradiation.

1. INTRODU~ION (refs. 6 and 7) of the Martian atmosphere allows an

NASA, through its Project Pathfinder, has put in place estimate of the absorption and scattering out of the
a wide-ranging set of advanced technology programs beam. These estimateswere derived from imagestaken
to address future needs of manned spaceexploration. of the Sun and Phobos with a special diode on the
Included in the mission setsunder study is the estab- Viking lander cameras.
lishment of outposts on the surface of Mars. The Sur- Earth-terrestrial insolation data are accumulated
face Power program in Pathfinder is aimed at providing over many yearsat different locations around the world
ultralightweight photovoltaic array technology for such and are given as long-term average values. The optical
an application. Detailed information on solar radiation depth data for Mars are derived from less than two
data on the Martian surface is necessaryto allow more Mars years. Consequently, the calculated insolation,
accurate estimates of photovoltaic power system size in the present paper, corresponds to short-term data.
and mass in system analysis and trade-off studies of Furthermore, the measured opacities (optical depth)
relevant technology options. Of major concern are the and the calculated insolation pertain to just two lo-
dust storms, which have been observed to occur on cations on the Mars planet; Viking lander 1 (VL 1) is
local as well as on global scales, and their effect on located at 22.3”N latitude and 47.9”W longitude, and
solar array output. In general, the assumption has been Viking lander 2 (VL2) is located at 47.7”N latitude
that global storms would reduce solar array output es- and 225.7 ’ W longitude. However, the similarity in the
sentially to zero, becausethe opacity of the atmosphere properties of the dust suspended above the two landing
may rise to values ranging from 3 to 9, depending on sites suggeststhat they are also representative of ones
the severityof the storm. Furthermore, such high values at other locations, at least, at latitudes not too far from
of opacity may persist for long periods of time such the lander’s sites. Data from lander VLl may be used
that the requirement for energy storage quickly be- for latitudes 40”N to 40”s and data from lander VL2
comes much too large to be practical. As shown in refs. for higher latitudes. The Martian atmosphere consists
1 and 2 (and is believed to be published for the first mainly of suspended dust particles, the amounts of
time to the best of our knowledge), there is still an which vary daily, seasonally,and annually, depending
appreciable large diffuse component, even at high opa- on local and global storm intensities and their duration.
citites, so that solar array operation is still possible. The optical depth values given in the section entitled
Calculation of solar radiation incident on the top Optical Depth are assumed to be constant throughout
of Martian atmosphere and on the Martian surface has the day. Large values of optical depth correspond to
been previously published (refs. 3-5) taking into ac- global storms, i.e., days with low insolation (dark days).
count the direct beam component only of the solar The albedo of the Martian surfacevariesin the range
radiation. The introduction of the diffuse component of about 0.1 to 0.4. The irradiances derived in the sec-
in this paper became possiblewith the normalized net tion entitled Solar Radiation correspond to 0.1 albedo,
IIux function described in the paper. This paper is an but can be also used for other values of albedo, to the
extension of the study in refs. 1 and 2. first approximation.
As on the planet Earth, the solar radiation on the In this paper a normalized net solar flux function
surface of Mars is composed of two components: (i) is introduced from which, together with the variation
direct beam and (ii) diffuse component. The direct of the opacities, characteristics of the solar radiation
beam is affected by scattering and absorption along the on the Martian surface are calculated. This includes,
path from the top of the Martian atmosphere to the among others, the diurnal and hourly variation of the
Martian surface. Measurement of the optical depth global, beam and diffuse radiation on the horizontal
surface. The results are presented in a seriesof figures
* This work was done while the author was a National and tables. The solar radiation data and the procedure
Research Council-NASA Research Associate; on sabbatical presented in this paper can be used for the calculation
leave from Tel-Aviv University. of any desired solar radiation quantity in engineering
353
354 J. APPELBAUM and D. J. FLOOD

design. New information about Mars may be forth- as long as on the Earth, corresponding to the greater
coming in the future from new analysis of previously length of the Martian year (Table 1). Furthermore,
collected data, from new Earth-based observation, or they are distinctly unequal in duration as a result of
from future flight missions. The Mars solar radiation the appreciable eccentricity of the Martian orbit. For
data will thus be updated accordingly. that reason, the Martian year is not divided into
months. Table 1 gives the duration of the Martian sea-
2. OFHCAL DEPTH sons in terrestrial and Martian days (a Martian day
a sol, 1 sol = 24.65 hr). Areocentric longitudes Ls
The most direct and probably most reliable esti-
= 0” and 180” correspond to the spring and fall equi-
mates of opacity are those derived from Viking lander
nox for the northern hemisphere, respectively, and L,
imaging of the Sun. Figures 1 and 2 show the seasonal
= 90” and 270’ correspond to northern and southern
variation of the normal incidence of the optical depth
summer solstices,respectively.
at the Viking lander locations VLl and VL2, respec-
tively. The season is indicated by the value of L,, ar-
3. GLOBAL AND LOCAL DUST STORMS
eocentric longitude of the Sun, measured in the orbital
plane of the planet from its vernal equinox, L, = 0”. The intensity of Martian global and local dust
Figures 1 and 2 were derived from references by Pol- storms [ 8,9] is defined in terms of opacity of the dust
lack [ 6,7] and Zurek [ 8 ] and were discretized for each it raises. Global dust storms are those which obscure
5” of L, value. As mentioned before, the optical depth planetary-scale sections of the Martian surface for
is assumed to remain constant throughout the day. many Martian days (~01s))whereas local dust storms
Opacities are minimum during the northern spring (L, are lessintense, and form and dissipate in a few days
= O”-90”) and summer (L, = 90”-180”), and max- or less. From a photovoltaic system design point of
imum during southern spring (L, = 180”-270”) and view, the intensity, frequency, and duration of these
summer (L, = 270°-360”), the seasonsduring which storms may be viewed as partially cloudy and cloudy
most local and major dust storms occur. When dust days for which additional energy storage in the pho-
storms are not present, the optical depth is typically tovoltaic system must be taken into account. The
about 0.5. Two global dust storms occurred during the characteristicsofglobal and local dust storms are listed
periods of each observation as indicated by the high below.
values of the optical depth (they are lower bound
values). 3.1 Global dust storms
Mars has seasonscomparable to those of Earth. 1. One, or occasionally two global dust storms of
However, the seasonsare on the average about twice planetary scale may occur each Martian year. The

3.5

2.5

0 60 120 180 240 300 360

AREOCENTRJCLONGITUDE. Ls, DEG

Fig. 1. Opticaldepth asmeasuredfor Viking Lander VLl as function of areocentric longitude.

 Solarradiation on Mars 355

2.5

0 60 120 180 240 300 360

AREOCENTRICLONtITlJDE, L,, DEG

Fig. 2. Opticaldepth asmeasuredfor Viking Lander VL2 asfunction of areocentriclongitude.

duration may vary from 35 to 70 days or more. 3. Local dust storms last a few days.
Although global dust storms do not occur every 4. The opacity of local dust storms may be assumed
year, their occurrence is fairly frequent. greater than 1.
2. Global dust storms begin near perihelion, when in-
solation is maximum (southern spring and sum-
4. SOLAR RADIATION AT THE TOP OF
mer) in the southern mid-latitude.
MARS ATMOSPHERE
3. The first global dust storm observed by VL ( 1977)
spread from a latitude of 40”s to a latitude 48”N The variation of the solar radiation at the top of
in about 5 to 6 days. the Mars atmosphere is governed by the location of
4. The opacity during the global dust storm is greater Mars in its orbit and by the solar zenith angle, and
than 1. is of direct beam radiation. The beam irradiance, in
W/m’, is given by:
3.2 Local dust storms
1. Local dust storms occur at almost all latitudes and
throughout the year. However, they have been ob-
servedto occur most frequently in the approximate
latitude belt 10” to 20”N and 20” to 4O”S, with where S is the solar constant at the mean Sun-Earth
more dust clouds seenin the south than in the north, distance of 1 AU, i.e., S = 1371 W/m’; r is the in-
- _ of which occurred during southern stantaneous Sun-Mars distance in AU (heliocentric
the maioritv
spring. distance) given by ref. 10:
2. Basedon Viking orbiter observations,it is estimated
that approximately 100 local storms occur in a given r= 41 -e2)
1 + e cos 0 (2)
Martian year.

Table 1. Mars seasonalduration

Areocentric Duration of the season
longitude
of the sun, Mars
Ls

Martian Terrestrial
days days

0 to 90” Spring Autumn 194 199

90 to 180" Summer Winter 178 183
180 to 270" Autumn Spring 143 147
270 to 360" or 0" Winter Summer 154 158
669 687
356 J. APPELBAUM and D. J. FLOOD

800

600

0 60 120 180 240 300 360

AREOCENTRIC LONGITUDE. L,. DEG

Fig. 3. Beam irradiance at the top of Mars atmosphere as function of areocentric longitude.

where a is the Mars semimajor axis in AU, and e is G = 590 [l + ecos(L, - 248”)12
the Mars eccentricity, i.e., e = 0.093377; and 0 is the ob (4)
(1 - e2)*
true anomaly given by:
and is shown in Fig. 3.
0 = L, - 248” (3) The beam irradiance on a horizontal surface is
where L, is the areocentric longitude and 248” is the
G &,, = G&OS 2 (5)
areocentric longitude of Mars perihelion. The Sun-
Mars mean distance in astronomical units (AU) is where z is the zenith angle of the incident solar radia-
1.52369 15; therefore, the mean beam irradiance at the tion given by:
top of the Martian atmosphere is 137 I / 1.52369 15*
= 590 W/m*. The instantaneous beam irradiance is cos z = sin C#J
sin 6 + cos i$ cos 6 cos 0 (6)
givenbyeqns(l)to(3):
where C#J = latitude; 6 = declination angle; w = hour
angle measured from the true noon westward. The solar
SPRING SUmER AUTUMN WINTER
declination angle is given by

20 sin 6 = sin &sin L, (7)

H 15

: 10
Y
kg 5
% 0
F:
z -5
3 0 = 900 0 = -900
-10 T = 18:00 T = 06:OO
z
2 -15
d
- -20
-25
0 90 180 270 360 +
AREOCENTRICLONGITUDE, Ls, DEG 0 = 00
T = 12:OO
Fig. 4. Variationof solardeclinationangle6,with areocentric
longitude, LS. Fig. 5. Solar time and hour angle relation.
 Solar radiation on Mars 357

600

500

0 0
12 14 16 18 20 12 14 16 18 20
SOLAR TINEE.H SOLAR TIR, H

Fig. 6. Diurnal variation of beam irradiance on a horizontal Fig. 7. Diurnal variation of hourly beam insolation on a hor-
surface at top of Mars atmosphere. izontal surface at top of Mars atmosphere in Mars watt hours
WH).

where 6, = 24.936” is the Mars obliquity of rotation

axis. The variation of the solar declination angle is
shown in Fig. 4. The four seasonspertain here to the
northern hemisphere, the reverseis true in the southern
hemisphere. The ratio of Mars to Earth length of day
is 24.65 / 24. It is convenient, for calculation purposes,
to define a Mars hour, H, by dividing the Martian day
(sol) into 24 hours. Using the same relationship be-
tween the Mars solar time T and the hour angle as for
the Earth, we write:
w = 15T- 180.
This is shown in Fig. 5. The final solar radiation results
can then be adjusted by the above ratio to correspond
to actual (terrestrial) time.
Examples of the solar radiation calculation proce-
dure and results in this paper pertain to L, = 69",
120”, 153”, 249’, and 299” at Viking lander VLl lo-
cation 4 = 22.3”N. Areocentric longitude L, = 69"
corresponds to aphelion; L, = 249’ to perihelion; L,
= 153” to mean radiation of 590 W/m*; L, = 120”
corresponds to the lowest atmosphere opacity of 0.4;
and L, = 299” to the highest opacity of 3.25 (Fig. 1).
For a given L, and latitude 4, one can calculate the
zenith angle z as function of solar time T using eqns
(6) to (8). The beam irradiance on a horizontal surface
is then determined using eqns (4) and (5). The diurnal
(8) variation of the beam it-radianceon a horizontal surface
at the top of the Mars atmosphere for the above-men-
tioned values of L, is shown in Fig. 6. Becauseof sym-
metry, only the afternoon values are shown in the fig-
ure. The sunset hour angle is given by ref. 11:
w, = cos-‘( -tan 4 tan 6) (9)

Table 2. Hourly and daily beam insolation on a horizontal surface at top

of Mars atmosphere [VL: $J= 22.3”N]

r Hourly Iobh (Hhr/m2) for Mars hours H ending at: Daily

H,bh,
(1 sol)
Whr/m2
I

L
14:oo 16:OO 17:oo la:00 19:oo

472 461 337 240 131 26 4248

510 449 363 256 138 24 4562
551 480 378 254 116 7 4745
467 386 270 129 a -- 3542
451 374 264 130 10 -- 3441
358 J. APPELBAUM and D. J. FLOOD

Table 3. Normalized net flux function f(z, 7) at the Martian surface

Optical Zenith angle Z,

depth dw

T 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 85

0.1 0.885 0.883 0.882 0.880 0.876 0.870 0.857 0.830 0.755 0.635
0.2 .866 .865 .860 .858 .851 .836 .813 .758 .640 .470
0.3 .847 .846 .841 .836 .826 .806 .774 .708 .562 .412
0.4 .828 .827 .821 .815 .802 ,778 .740 .667 .502 .373
0.5 .810 .810 .802 .796 .778 .752 .708 .628 .452 .342
0.6 .793 .791 .785 .775 .755 .725 .677 .593 .414 .318
0.7 .776 .773 .766 .755 .733 .700 .646 .555 .383 .298
0.8 .760 .756 .750 .736 .710 .675 .616 .520 .360 .280
0.9 .745 .740 .733 .717 .690 .650 .587 .487 .336 .264
1.0 .732 .725 .717 .700 .670 .628 .560 .455 .317 .252
1.1 .713 .709 .700 .682 .651 .604 .539 .433 .300 .239
.697 .692 .683 .662 .632 .585 .518 .413 .288 .230
1:: .682 .677 .667 ,646 .613 .567 .498 .394 .273 .220
1.4 .666 .661 .650 .629 .596 .546 .478 .379 .262 ,210
1.5 .651 .646 .633 .612 .580 .530 .460 .362 .251 .202
1.6 .637 .630 .618 .597 .563 .512 .441 .348 .240 ,195
1.7 .622 .615 .601 .581 .546 .494 .424 .332 .232 .188
1.8 .609 .600 .586 .568 .531 .480 .408 .318 .224 181
1.9 .596 .587 ,571 .551 .514 ,464 .393 .304 .217 :176
2.0 .582 .573 .558 .537 .500 .448 .378 .293 .208 .170
2.25 .552 .542 .522 .501 .462 .410 .343 .265 .190 156
2.50 .518 .509 .492 .469 .430 ,378 .316 .242 .174 :145
2.75 .486 .478 .462 .440 .401 .353 .293 .224 .158 .136
3.00 .460 .450 ,434 .414 .376 .330 .273 .206 .150 128
3.25 .434 .424 .410 .390 .354 .308 .254 .193 .140 :120
3.50 .411 .400 .387 .367 .333 .290 .240 ,180 .132 110
4.00 .370 .360 .347 .330 .296 .258 .212 .160 118 :100
5.00 .294 .286 .275 .258 .230 .203 .166 ,.130 :094 .080
6.00 .228 .223 .215 .200 .178 .153 .130 ,103 .080 .068

and the number of Mars daylight hours is define an hour. The daily solar insolation, Hobhron a
horizontal surface, in watt hours per square meter, is
often needed. This is obtained by integrating eqn ( 11)
Td = & cos-'( -tan + tan 6). (10) over the period from sunrise to sunset. One gets

It is of interest to calculate the solar beam insolation 24**

on a horizontal surface in watt hours per square meter Hobh = -G
a
( Whr/m 2), for a desired period of time between hour
angles wr and 02. This is obtained by integrating eqn
(5), i.e.,
+ cos 4 cos 6 sin w, .
1 (13)

Table 2 givesthe hourly beam insolation z&h, and the

Zobh = E Gob
daily beam insolation &bh, on a horizontal surface at
P
the top of the Mars atmosphere for actual terrestrial
-2
X (sin~sin6+cos~cos6cosw)dw (11) time. The diurnal variation of the hourly beam inso-
s WI lation in Mars watt hours (WH) is shown in Fig. 7.

or
5. SOLAR RADIATION ON THE SURFACE OF MARS
12*
Zobh = n The variation of the solar radiation on the Martian
surface is governed by three factors: (i) the Mars-Sun
+ cos $ cos G(sin w2 - sin wi) . (12) distance, (ii) solar zenith angle, and (iii) the opacity
I
of the Martian atmosphere. The global solar radiation
A commonly used quantity is the hourly insolation, is composed of the direct beam and diffuse compo-
in watt hours per square meter. In that case(Joand w2 nents. The direct beam irradiance, Gb, on the Martian

* Replace 12 by 12.325 in eqns ( 11) and ( 12) to get the * * Replace 24 by 24.65 in eqn ( 13) to get the insolation
insolation with reference to actual (terrestrial) time. with reference to actual (terrestrial) time.
 Solar radiation on Mars 359

600
net flux functionf( Z,T) where the parameters are the
zenith angle z and the optical depth T. This table per-
500
tains to an albedo of 0.1 but can be used for higher
albedo values to a first approximation. Using this data
we calculated the global solar irradiance. We assumed
400 that the diffuse irradiance is obtained by subtracting
the beam from the global irradiance.
The solar irradiance components, on a horizontal
300
Martian surface, are related by

Gh = Gbh+ Gdh (16)

where Gh global irradiance on a horizontal surface; Gbh

direct beam irradiance on a horizontal surface; Gd,,
diffuse irradiance on a horizontal surface. The diffuse
irradiance of the Martian atmosphere may be a result
of a different mechanism than that for the Earth at-
mosphere, nevertheless, to a first approximation, we
will apply eqn ( 16) as for Earth-terrestrial calculations.

600

500

400

300

200

100

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
SUN ZENITH ANGLE. Z. DEG
(B) EFFECT OF SUN ZENITH ANGLEWITH OPTICAL DEPTHAS A
PARMTER.

Fig. 8. Variation of global irradiance with optical depth and

sun zenith angle on a horizontal surface. (A) Effect of optical 6 OPTICAL DEPTH, T
depth with sun zenith angle as a parameter. (B) Effect of sun 2 (A) EFFECTOF OPTICAL DEPTHWITH SUN ZENITH ANGLEAS A
cc
zenith angle with optical depth as a parameter. PARANETER.
5
Y

surface normal to the solar rays is related by Beer’s 600

law to the optical depth, 7, of the intervening atmo-
spheric haze:

Gb = G,bexp[-Tm(z)] (14)

where m(z) is the air mass determined by the zenith

angle z, and can be approximated, for zenith angles
up to about 80”, by

1
m(z) g -
cos z .
The net solar flux integrated over the solar spectrum
on the Martian surface was calculated by Pollack [ 121
based on the multiple wavelength and multiple scat-
tering of the solar radiation. Derived data from this
calculation are shown in Table 3 by the normalized
(15)
0
SUN ZENITH ANGLE. Z. DEG
(B) EFFECT OF SUN ZENITH ANGLEWITH OPTICAL DEPTHAS A
PARAKTER.
Fig. 9. Variation of beam irradiance with optical depth and
sun zenith angle on a horizontal surface. (A) Effect of optical
depth with sun zenith angle as a parameter. (B) Effect of sun
zenith angle with optical depth as a parameter.
360 J. APPELBAUM and D. J. FLOOD

200

0
i 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
= 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 SOLARTIME. H
.
E OPTICAL DEPTH. T
5 (A) EFFECT OF OPTICAL DEPTH WITH SUN ZENITH ANGLE AS A Fig. 12. Diurnal variation of global Gh, beam Gbh, and diffuse
9 PARAMETER. Cd,,k-radiance on a horizontal Mars surface at Viking Lander
s VLI.
w
Y 400
k
E
300 Gbh
= G&OS Z exp (18)

The diffuse irradiance on a horizontal surface is ob-

tained from eqns ( 16 ) to ( 18 ) . Figures 8 to 10 describe
the variation of the global, beam and diffuse irradi-
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 antes, respectively, on a horizontal Martian surface:
SUN ZENITH ANGLE. Z. DEG and are given in pairs as functions of the optical depth
(B) EFFECT Cf SUN ZENITH ANGLE WITH OPTICAL DEPTH AS A r and zenith angle z. The irradiances were calculated
PARAMETER.
based on Table 3 data and the mean irradiance of 590
Fig. 10. Variation ofdiffuse irradiance with optical depth and W/m’. The variation of the global irradiance Gh, eqn
sun zenith angle on a horizontal surface. (A) Effect of optical ( 17), is shown in Fig. 8. The beam irradiance Gbh is
depth with sun zenith angle as a parameter. (B) Effect of sun obtained using eqn ( 18) and is shown in Fig. 9. The
zenith angle with optical depth as a parameter.
beam irradiance shows a sharp decrease with increasing
optical depth, and a relatively moderate decrease with
The global irradiance Gh on a horizontal surface is given increasing zenith angle. The diffuse irradiance Gdh is
by shown in Fig. 10. The diffuse irradiance shows a sliding
maximum with the variation of the zenith angle.
Gh = GobcosZ F (17) The solar radiation (global, beam and diffuse) vari-
ation (diurnal, hourly and daily) can be calculated
The beam irradiance Gbh on a horizontal surface is based on the preceeding equations and the f (2,~) data
obtained by of Table 3. The following examples pertain again to
the Viking lander VLl location and areocentric lon-
gitudes L, = 69”, 120”, 153”, 249’, and 299”. Daily
600 solar insolation are also given for L, = O", 30", 60",
"(.I: Q= 22.3' N, L, = 153'e T = 0.5. G,h = 590 Id/"'
90”, 150”, 180”, 210”, 240”, 300”, and 330”. For a
500

100

0
4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
SOLARTIME. H

Fig. 11. Diurnal variation of global G, , beam Gbh,and diffuse

Gdhirradiance on a horizontal Mars surface at Viking Lender
VLI. 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
SOLARTIME, H

* The factor 0.9 comes from the expression ( 1 - albedo) Fig. 13. Diurnal variation ofglobal Gh, beam G,,, and diffuse
in the denominator. For an albedo of 0.1, the denominator Gdhirradiance on a horizontal Mars surface at Viking Lander
is 0.9. VLI.
 Table 4. Hourly and daily global insolation on a horizontal surface at Mars surface [ VLI: $J= 22.3”N]
Hourly global insolation Ih (Whr/m*) for Mars hours H ending at: 1 Daily (1 sol) global 1 Daylight Daily mean
insolation, hours global
"h? -fd$ irradiance,
18:00 19:oo Whr/m* hr Wtm*

431 270 175 80 11 3430 13.70 r 250

490 314 206 101 15 3965 13.60 292
522 310 190 75 3 3987 12.96 308
315 125 46 2 -- 1951 10.95 178
175 63 25 1 -- 1052 11.04 95

Table 5. Hourly and daily beam insolation on a horizontal surface at Mars surface [VLI: 6 = 22.3”N]
Hourly beam insolation Ibh (Whr/m2) for Mars hours H ending at: 1 Daily (1 sol) beam 1 Daylight Daily mean
insolation, hours beam
"bhl Td, irradiance,
Day-L, T 13:oo 14:oo 15:oo 16:OO 17:oo 18:00 19:oo Whr/m* hr W/m*

69" 0.65 259 236 191 131 69 21 3 1816 13.70 133 0

3
120" .40 362 331 272 195 106 34 2 2603 13.60 191
153" .50 354 318 251 167 79 15 -- 2371 12.96 183 E
249" 1.40 71 51 27 10 2 -- -- 323 10.95 29 9
299" 3.25 3 2 1 --- -- -- -- 12 11.04 1

Table 6. Hourly and daily diffuse insolation on horizontal surface at Mars surface [ VL 1: q5= 22.3ON]
Hourly diffuse insolation Idh (Whr/m2) for Mars hours H ending at: 1 Daily (1 sol) diffuse 1 Daylight I Daily mean
insolation, diffuse
Hdh* irradiance,
Day-L, T 13:oo 14:oo 15:oo 16:00 17:oo 18:00 19:oo Whr/m* W/m*

69” 0.65 173 164 156 139 106 60 10 1615 13.70 118
120" .40 128 127 125 119 101 67 13 1362 13.60 roe
153" -50 167 165 159 143 111 60 3 1617 12.96 125
249" 1.40 244 226 183 115 44 2 -- 1629 10.95 149
299" 3.25 172 151 109 63 25 1 -- 1039 11.04 94
I-
362 J. APPELBAUM and D. J. FLOOD

0 60 120 180 240 300 360

AREOCENTRICLONGITUDE. L,, DEG

Fig. 16. Daily global insolation on a horizontal Mars surface

“12 14 16 18 20
SOLAR TIE, H
Fig. 14. Diurnal variation of hourly global insolation on a
horizontal surface on Martian surface.
given L, and $, one can calculate the variation of the
zenith angle z as function of the Mars solar time T
using eqns ( 5 ) to ( 8). Referring to Fig. 1 for the given
L,, the optical depth r is determined; with Table 3 and
eqns ( 16) to ( 18) one can calculate the solar radiation
variation for the given day. The results are shown in
Figs. 11 to 13. Becauseof symmetry around 12:00, the
graphs in Figs. 12 and 13 are the forenoon or afternoon
variation. The figures show clearly that for higher
opacities, the diffuse component dominates the solar
radiation.
The hourly insolation (global, beam and diffuse)
on a horizontal surfacecan be calculated based on Figs.
at Viking Lander VLI.
11 to 13 by integrating hourly areas. The daily inso-
lation Hh on a horizontal surface is the summation of
the hourly values. The beam insolation, for a desired
period of time, can be also calculated by:
12*
Ibh = 7 Gob O2(sin $I sin 6
s a,
+ cos q5cos 6 cos w)exp[ -r/
(sin C$sin 6 + cos C#J
cos 6 cos w)]dw. (19)
Tables 4 to 6 give the hourly global IJ,, beam I&,
and diffuse Idh insolation as well asthe daily global Hh,
beam Hbh and diffuse Hdh insolation. Included in the
tables are also the number of Martian daylight hours
and the daily mean irradiance. For a day (L, = 299)
with a relative high opacity, the daily mean global ir-
radiance is still appreciable and is about 30% of that
in a clearday. The diurnal variation of the hourly global
insolation on a horizontal surface in Mars watt hours
(WH) is shown in Fig. 14. The percentage of diffuse
and beam insolation for the five analyzed L, days is
shown in Fig. 15. The daily global insolation on a hor-
izontal surface on Mars is shown in Fig. 16 for twelve
areocentric longitudes covering a Martian year. Using
the procedure outlined, one can calculate the variation
of the solar radiation for any desired day to use for any
engineering system design.

6. CONCLUSIONS

Effective design and utilization of solar energy de-

pend to a large extent on adequate knowledge of solar
radiation characteristics in the region of solar energy
system operation. In this paper we presented a pro-
cedure and solar radiation related data from which the
diurnally, hourly and daily variation of insolation on
Mars were calculated. This includes the global, beam
120 153 249 299
69
AREOCENTRICLONGITUDE. L,, DEG
and diffuse insolation on a horizontal surface, from

Fig. 15. Percent of diffuse and direct beam insolation on a * Replace the 12 by 12.325 in eqn (19) toget the insolation
horizontal Mars surface. with reference to actual (terrestrial) time.
 Solar radiation on Mars 363

which any desired solar radiation quantity can be de- airmass

rived for an engineering design. The global insolation Sun-Mars distance
solar constant = 1371 W/m2 at the mean Sun-
on the surface of Mars was derived based on the nor- Earth distanceof 1 astronomicalunit (AU)
malized net solar flux functionf(z,r); the beam in- Mars solar time
solation was determined by Beer’s law relating the in- Mars daylight hours
solation to the optical depth of the Martian atmosphere; zenith angle
and the diffuse insolation was calculated as the differ- declination angle
obliquity
ence between the global and the beam insolation. The true anomaly
optical depths were measured at the two Viking lander optical depth
locations, but can also be used, to the first approxi- latitude
mation, for other locations. One of the most important hour angle
sunset hour angle
results of this study is that there is a large diffuse com-
ponent of the insolation, even at high optical depth,
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