Correcting for Circumsolar and Near-Horizon Errors in Sky Cover Retrievals from Sky Images

Fractional sky cover amounts retrieved from sky imagery are overestimated significantly at times due to occurrences of “whitening” near the sun, and near the horizon for low sun, in the images. This phenomenon occurs due to forward scattering of visible light by aerosols and haze, and the intensity range limitations of the detectors of the cameras used to record the sky images. Our results suggest that when the problem occurs, the magnitude of the overestimate is typically on the order of about 10% to 20% fractional sky cover. To help alleviate this problem, a statistical analysis of the time series of the areas in the image near the sun position and along the horizon centered on the solar azimuth angle has been developed. This statistical analysis requires that images be captured frequently, at least once per minute. For times when the overestimation is detected as occurring, a correction is applied to the retrieved sky cover amounts. When the sky cover amount correction is applied, analysis indicates that the result better matches the actual sky conditions present, as noted by visual inspection of the sky images in question. In addition, frequency-of-occurrence histogram comparisons show that the adjusted results improve the agreement with other methodologies and expectations. Thus, the methodology presented here helps produce more accurate fractional sky cover retrievals.