Evaluation of annual radiation and windiness over a playa: Possibility of harvesting the solar and wind energies

Abstract

We set up an automatic weather station over a playa (the flat floor of an undrained desert basin that becomes at times a shallow lake), approximately 65 km east-west by 130 km north-south, located at the U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground (40°08′N, 113°27′W, 1124 m above mean sea level) in north-western Utah, U.S.A., in 1999. This station measured the incoming (Rsi) and outgoing (Rso) solar or shortwave radiation using two CM21 Kipp & Zonen pyranometers (one inverted), the incoming (Rli or atmospheric) and outgoing (Rlo or terrestrial) longwave radiation, using two CG1 KippZonen pyrgeometers (one inverted), and the net (Rn) radiation using a Q*7 net radiometer (Radiation Energy Balance System, ..