Design and performance analysis of an automated 10-channel solar radiometer instrument

Abstract

An automated multichannel solar radiometer has been designed and fabricated by the Atmospheric Remote Sensing Laboratory at The University of Arizona. The automated radiometer has 10 separate silicon-photodiode-based channels that allow near-simultaneous solar spectral measurements through narrow bandpass filters (approximately 10 nm) from the visible to near-IR regions. The photodiode detectors are temperature stabilized using a heating temperature controller circuit. The instrument is pointed toward the sun via an autotracking system that actively tracks the sun with a ±0.05° tracking accuracy. The instrument can continuously collect data for about 22 h at once per minute sample rate. This paper presents instrument design features as well as some performance and experimental results for the automated solar radiometer.