USER INSTRUCTIONS
UPDATED MARCH 18, 2013

FOR PUERTO RICO ONLY:  Maps of the data are available at the following URLs:  
http://academic.uprm.edu/hdc/GOES-PRWEB_RESULTS/solar_radiation/   (daily results)
http://academic.uprm.edu/hdc/GOES-PRWEB_MONTHLY_RESULTS/solar_radiation/
http://academic.uprm.edu/hdc/GOES-PRWEB_ANNUAL_RESULTS/



Spatial resolution:
Puerto Rico, Culebra, Vieques and U.S. Virgin Islands 1-km
Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica and Cuba 2-km

Range of data for 1-km dataset: March 2009 through present. The data set is not entirely complete. Technical problem prevented data from being collected between mid January through mid March 2011.

Range of data for 2-km dataset: Early March 2010 through present. The data set is not entirely complete. Technical problem prevented data from being collected between mid January through mid March 2011.

Format of data files: The name of the data file indicates where the data is from. RICO signifies Puerto Rico, Culebra, Vieques and U.S. Virgin Islands. CARIB signifies Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica and Cuba. Also given in the file name is the julian day and year. For example, 2010079, indicated the year 2010, julian day 79. The extension on the file is .gz, which can be unzipped with any compression software such as WinZip or or 7-Zip and can be downloaded at the following site http://www.filehippo.com .

DAILY INTEGRATED SOLAR RADIATION DATA:  The unzipped file is a text file. If the file is imported into an Excel spreadsheet, you will see three columns of data: column 1 is solar radiation in units of megajoules per square meter per day x 100, column 2 is latitude north and column 3 is longitude west. To obtain the solar radiation in megajoules per square meter per day, simply divide the value by 100. In case you have trouble importing the data into Excel, you may need to do the following.   -9999 values indicate that data is not available at the associated latitude and longitude.    

In Excel, when you navigate to the subdirectory with the daily solar radiation data file, if you do not see the file, then in the bottom right corner of the dialbox, click on All Excel Files, then click All Files.  Now you will see all extensions in the subdirectory.  When you select the desired file and click OK, a new dialbox will open and you will see the data.  Select “Delimited” option and then click Next.  Now click Space and again then click Finish. 

HOURLY SOLAR RADIATION DATA:  The unzipped file is a text file. If the file is imported into an Excel spreadsheet, you will see two rows starting with the labels XLAT and XLON.  Select the top two rows, then move (cut) the data to the right by one column, then delete the blank (first column).  The numbers in the top two rows are the time of day in UTC.  UTC is 4 hours earlier than Puerto Rico Time, therefore for Puerto Rico, subtract 4 from each number.  If you are working in Cuba for example, then you should subtract the appropriate number of hours depending on the time zone.  Below the top two rows you will see the Latitude and Longitude (columns 1 and 2) followed by the solar radiation in Watts per meter squared.  (Note that the units are different from the daily integrated data.)   

In Excel, when you navigate to the subdirectory with the hourly solar radiation data file, if you do not see the file, then in the bottom right corner of the dialbox, click on All Excel Files, then click All Files.  Now you will see all extensions in the subdirectory.  When you select the desired file and click OK, a new dialbox will open and you will see the data.  Select the “Delimited” option and then click Next.  Now click Space and finally click Finish.