Estimating and statistically analyzing the global solar radiation potential over big cities in Turkey

This study develops empirical models in order to estimate the monthly average daily global solar radiation on a horizontal surface (H). The seven big cities considered in the model have 33.4% of Turkey's population and are as follows: Izmir in the Aegean Sea, Samsun in the Black Sea, Ankara in the Central Anatolia, Van in the East Anatolia, Istanbul in the Marmara, Antalya in the Mediterranen Sea, and Urfa in the Southeast Anatolia Region of Turkey. The developed models were analyzed using the seven statistical analyzing methods such as the mean percentage error (MPE), mean absulate percentage error (MAPE), sum of squares of relative error (SSRE), relative standard error (RSE), mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE) and correlation coefficient (R). It may be concluded that the present models estimate the values of H, reasonably well for the cities studied and possibly elsewhere with similar climatic conditions.