Simplified Model to Approach the Theoretical Clear Sky Solar PV Generation Curve through a Gaussian Approximation

Radiation forecast is the milestone of the solar energy industry, making possible the existence of the whole market. Solar radiation models allow scientists and engineers to predict the behaviour of a PV system to perform technical and economic analysis. Despite the existence of numerous models, most of them are highly complex or require massive amounts of data, limiting solar energy start-ups. As a result, a state-of-the-art review was performed and based on it this study proposed a simple model that allows emerging solar companies to create preliminary analysis for their clients. The proposed model calculates the instant power of the envelope curve of PV generation, based on the Gaussian bell equation, by using the daily specific energy and a deviation proportional to the sun hours of the geographical information as parameters. With accurate meteorological data, results showed an acceptable performance, with a more straightforward implementation, when compared against those reported in the literature.

SwimOne. New Device for Determining Instantaneous Power and Propulsive Forces in Swimming

The propulsive forces and instantaneous power that are generated by a swimmer have a great influence on the swimming performance. This works presents a new device, called SwimOne, for measuring propulsive force and estimating the instantaneous power of the swimmer. In addition, the detailed prototype is able to exert a customizable opposition force to the swimmer for training purpose. The conceptual idea is presented by describing the differential equation of the swimmer and the protocol for a factible estimation of the instantaneous power. The variables that are to be measured and estimated are identified and, consequently, the sensor and actuator systems can be selected. The high-level and detailed designs of the prototype are presented together with the protocol that is carried out in order to validate the sensor and actuation systems. The device is able to monitor the variables of interest of the swimmer together with the propulsive force and instant power. Finally, some experiments are carried out providing the results of several participants swimming in crawl, backstroke, butterfly, and breaststroke styles in the presence of different opposition force. The preliminary results show that SwimOne is valid for measuring instantaneous force and power with different loads in swimming.

Smart Energy Meter For Iot Applications

as domestic electrical energy consumption keeps increasing, consumers become more aware of energy usage and efficiency because of economic and environmental reasons. The energy meter described in this paper is aimed at household smart metering for better energy management. The meter system uses a single microcontroller to acquire mains voltage and current waveforms and calculate power parameters: RMS voltage and current, instant power, power factor and energy. These parameters are stored locally on memory card for long period standalone recording, or transmitted in real time using an IoT Long Range radio for instant readings or short period monitoring. Measurement data of electrical power usage of a typical family household and energy consumption is presented where domestic appliance patterns are identified over an operating period. These patterns enable the estimation of energy usage distribution among appliances.

Are GPUs Non-Green Computing Devices?

With energy consumption emerging as one of the biggest issues in the development of HPC (High Performance Computing) applications, the importance of detailed power-related research works becomes a priority. In the last years, GPU coprocessors have been increasingly used to accelerate many of these high-priced systems even though they are embedding millions of transistors on their chips delivering an immediate increase on power consumption necessities. This paper analyzes a set of applications from the Rodinia benchmark suite in terms of CPU and GPU performance and energy consumption. Specifically, it compares single-threaded and multi-threaded CPU versions with GPU implementations, and characterize the execution time, true instant power and average energy consumption to test the idea that GPUs are power-hungry computing devices.