Solar radiation over Saudi Arabia and comparisons with empirical models

We present a comparison between models developed by the present authors and 16 other models for different geographical and varied meteorological conditions. The comparisons are made using the mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE), mean percentage error (MPE), and mean absolute bias error (MABE). These errors are calculated using monthly-mean, measured daily and estimated values of total solar radiation for 41 locations in Saudi Arabia. We find that our latitude, longitude, altitude, and sunshine-duration-dependent model given in Eq. (1)produced the best estimates for global solar radiation. The second- and third-best estimates were obtained from our linear model and other models given in Eq. (2)and Eq. (11), respectively.     

Geothermal resources in Saudi Arabia

The aim of this reconnaissance of the volcanic harrats and thermal springs in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was to identify areas of potential geothermal interest.On the harrats, the petrographic evolution of the various magmatic series was systematically studied, placing each in its structural context, and tackling the problem of the possible existence of reservoirs. At this stage of our study, it is not possible to approach the problem of reservoir recharge. Hydrogeochemical studies were carried out on the thermal springs.     

Energy analysis of Saudi Arabia

This study provides an energy outlook for Saudi Arabia's energy resources, their production and consumption, as well as their future projections. Crude oil, natural gas and refined products, and electricity are the main energy resources of the country. Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that has the largest crude oil reserves and this is one of the main energy producers. The high growth rates of Saudi Arabia's population and the sectoral energy utilization are the two main factors affecting its energy consumption dramatically. Moreover, Saudi Arabia is not only one of the main energy producers in the world but is also one of the world's largest energy consumers per capita. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Solar-hydrogen energy system for Saudi Arabia

A model for solar-hydrogen energy system for Saudi Arabia has been developed by obtaining relationships for and between main energy and energy-related parameters. The parameters’ magnitude and trends with and without hydrogen introduction have been investigated over a period of time. The results indicate that the oil resources of Saudi Arabia would not be enough to meet the domestic and export markets starting in three to four decades. The results also show that adopting the solar-hydrogen energy system would extend the availability of oil resources, reduce pollution, and establish a permanent energy system for Saudi Arabia. They also indicate that Saudi Arabia could become an exporter of hydrogen forever.     

Photovoltaic-thermal solar energy experiment in Saudi Arabia

Solar energy is now globally utilized as an alternative energy source. The sun's power is an infinite source of energy and that technology breakthrough is continously undertaken to increase the efficiency of the hardware converting sunlight into useful energy. There are two methods to utilized solar energy, photovoltaic - the direct conversion of sun light beam into electrical energy and thermal method, the utilization of the sun's dissipated heat into useful applications. Applying both methods into one system enable the use of solar energy into the maximum. This results to a hybrid system called Photovoltaic-Thermal system. This paper evaluates the system from the Saudi Arabian environmental condition.     

Global solar radiation in Northeastern Saudi Arabia

This paper presents the actual global solar radiation on a horizontal surface along with the prevailing meteorological conditions encountered during the measurement period from 1 January–31 December, for one complete year, in the Arabian Gulf Coast near the city of Dhahran. High resolution, real time solar radiation and meteorological data were collected, and processed. Hourly, daily, and monthly statistics of solar radiation was made from the one-minute averaged recorded values. The highest measured daily, and monthly mean solar radiation were found to be 351 and 328 W/m⁻², respectively. The highest one-minute averaged solar radiation values up to 1183 W/m⁻² were observed in the summer season, from May–September. The highest hourly solar radiation value was recorded as 1053 W/m⁻² in the middle of June. Beside the global solar radiation measurements, the main observed meteorological parameters were temperature, pressure, wind speed, precipitation, and relative humidity. On the other hand, the estimation of daily and monthly mean global solar radiation was performed based upon two empirical formulas which relate the solar radiation to the sunshine duration, relative humidity, maximum temperature, the latitude of the monitoring location, sunset hour and declination angles. The agreement between the measured and estimated solar radiation values was found to be satisfactory. Nevertheless, the empirical formula under-estimates the solar radiation values during summer, and over-estimates during winter.     

沙特钻修井技术

针对沙特油田产层开发特点,介绍了中原钻井在沙特钻井承包施工中采用的边漏边钻、边涌边钻、清水解卡、小井眼钻井、短半径水平井钻井、多底井钻井等先进技术,有效地降低了钻井成本,利用了每口井的资源,大大提高了单井产量,对国内钻修井技术的发展有一定参考作用。     

The natural gas potential of Saudi Arabia

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has the fourth largest natural gas (NG) reserves in the world. One third of these reserves are located in the Ghawar region of Eastern Province. NG production is controlled tightly due to close conjunction with oil production until recently. KSA’s NG production of 85 billion cubic meters in 2015 from 70 billion cubic meters in 2008 sets an average annual increase of 2.7%. More than half of the annual KSA’s NG production has been accompanied by gas. The Saudi Gas Initiative (SGI) aims to increase foreign investment in the NG development sector through petrochemicals, power generation, and gas development while integrating with salt water desalination. The barriers in the success of motor fuel policies include high initial capital costs, lack of information or skills, less market acceptance, technology limitations, and financing risks. This article aims to review the potential of NG as an alternative to oil and coal in KSA in meeting the country’s high energy requirements.     

Modelling industrial energy demand in Saudi Arabia

Between 1986 and 2016, industrial energy consumption in Saudi Arabia increased by tenfold, making it one of the largest end-use sectors in the Kingdom. Despite its importance, there appear to be no published econometric studies on aggregate industrial energy demand in Saudi Arabia. We model aggregate industrial energy demand in Saudi Arabia using Harvey’s (1989) Structural Time Series Model, showing that it is both price and income inelastic, with estimated long-run elasticities of −0.34 and 0.60, respectively. The estimated underlying energy demand trend suggests improvements in energy efficiency starting from 2010.Applying decomposition analysis to the estimated econometric equation highlights the prominent roles of the activity effect (the growth in industrial value added) and the structure effect (the shift towards energy-intensive production) in driving industrial energy demand growth. Moreover, the decomposition shows how exogenous factors such as energy efficiency helped mitigate some of that growth, delivering cumulative savings of 6.8 million tonnes of oil equivalent (Mtoe) between 2010 and 2016.Saudi Arabia implemented a broad energy price reform program in 2016, which raised electricity, fuel, and water prices for households and industry. The decomposition results reveal that, holding all else constant, higher industrial energy prices in 2016 reduced the sector’s energy consumption by 6.9 %, a decrease of around 3.0 Mtoe. Saudi policymakers could therefore build on the current policy of energy price reform and energy efficiency standards to mitigate the rate of growth of industrial energy consumption, increase economic efficiency, and maintain industrial sector competitiveness.     

Need for thermal-storage air-conditioning in Saudi Arabia

In Saudi Arabia, the growth of demand for electrical energy in the rapidly expanding towns, cities and industries, far exceeds the growth of the power being made available. Recently the Saudi Consolidated Electric Companies (SCECO) are facing a shortage of electricity during the summer period mainly due to the high consumption of electricity in the air conditioning sector. The incorporation of thermal energy storage (TES) technologies with a conventional air conditioning system is found to be an appropriate solution for energy-demand management. In this paper an introductory overview of thermal storage air conditioning is presented, comparing phase change (e.g. ice) and sensible heat (e.g. chilled water) storage technologies. The pros and cons of each are evaluated. The suitability of TES technology for the Saudi HVAC (heating, ventilating and air conditioning) industry is explored with the benefits to the owner such as: reduced energy consumption; less operation and maintenance costs; and downsizing of the chiller plant and system for new facility; alternative to new chiller installation to cater for increased cooling load; and stored water as a fire protection source. Furthermore, an economic study has been presented to illustrate the feasibility of TES based air conditioning in Saudi Arabia.     

Application of neural networks for the prediction of hourly mean surface temperatures in Saudi Arabia

This paper utilizes artificial neural networks for the prediction of hourly mean values of ambient temperature 24 h in advance. Full year hourly values of ambient temperature are used to train a neural network model for a coastal location — Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. This neural network is trained off-line using back propagation and a batch learning scheme. The trained neural network is successfully tested on temperatures for years other than the one used for training. It requires only one temperature value as input to predict the temperature for the following day for the same hour. The predicted hourly temperature values are compared with the corresponding measured values. The mean percent deviation between the predicted and measured values is found to be 3.16, 4.17 and 2.83 for three different years. These results testify that the neural network can be a valuable tool for hourly temperature prediction in particular and other meteorological predictions in general.     

Applications of Thermal Energy Storage in Saudi Arabia

In Saudi Arabia, the heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) system typically accounts for 65% of the total electrical energy consumption in buildings. This is due to a very high ambient temperature which persists for a long period of time in a summer season. Moreover, gas turbines efficiency decrease also with the high ambient temperatures. In the HVAC industry cool storage, or commonly known as Thermal Energy Storage (TES) is the most preferred demand side management (DSM) technology for shifting cooling electrical demand from peak daytime periods to off‐peak night‐time. The most popular and well‐suited TES concept for Saudi Arabia is either chilled water or ice storage system, depending upon the applications and the required storage capacity. This paper shows how TES offers a means of reducing the electrical demand in large commercial buildings. Additionally, it is seen that efficiencies of the air cooled chillers are increased if they run overnight. Similarly efficiencies of gas turbine is also increased when a TES based pre‐cooled air is used as an inlet to the turbine. This paper also discusses favouring conditions and other aspects of cool storage applications in Saudi Arabia. TES economics are considered and a cost analysis is presented to illustrate the potential savings that can be achieved by the use of TES in Saudi Arabia. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Prospects of wind farm development in Saudi Arabia

This paper presents the energy output of wind farms in terms of unadjusted energy, gross energy, renewable energy delivered, specific yield and wind farm capacity factor. The analysis also includes the comparison of energy output from two methods: (i) the RETScreen model and (ii) the actual frequency and wind turbine power curve. The energy output analysis is done using three wind energy conversion systems of rated capacity 600, 1000, and 1500 kW. The study is performed for 30 MW installed capacity wind farms at five coastal locations in Saudi Arabia.Furthermore, the RETScreen software is also used to perform the economical feasibility study of the wind farms at these locations. The study concludes that of the five wind parks, Yanbo and Dhahran are the only two sites where wind park development is economically feasible. Finally, wind park development at Yanbo will result in a reduction in greenhouse gases of 31369, 23601, and 26087 tons each year, corresponding to 1500, 1000, and 600 kW machine wind parks, respectively. On the other hand, at Dhahran, installation of wind machines of 1500, 1000, and 600 kW sizes will reduce the GHGs by 26183, 19247, and 21533 tons per year.     

Ultraviolet solar radiation at Dhahran, Saudi Arabia

Measurements of ultraviolet solar radiation for the period January 1985 to December 1987 at Dhahran (26°32′N, 50°13′E), Saudi Arabia, are analyzed. Dependence of ultraviolet radiation on the atmospheric clearness index is investigated. For a clearness index above 0.65, the ratio of ultraviolet radiation to total horizontal radiation is a constant value of 3.45%. For a clearness index below 0.65, the ratio was found to vary significantly with clearness index but it was also a strong function of the meteorological events (i.e., rainfall, clouds and suspended dust) bringing about the clearness index change. A ratio of ultraviolet to total horizontal radiation as high as 4.6% was reached on a rainy day, while a ratio as low as 2.1% was obtained for a dusty day.     

Simulation and modeling of solar radiation in Saudi Arabia

A mathematical model is used to generate the hourly data for the total solar radiation on a horizontal surface. The generated data are based on the hourly recorded visibility data for 20 years (1970–1989). The model year technique was then applied to model the 20 years of hourly data of solar radiation into one statistically representative year. A model year of hourly data was then generated for the beam and diffuse components of solar radiation on a horizontal surface. Similarly, a model year of hourly data was also generated for the total solar radiation on tilted surfaces with different orientations with its beam, diffuse and reflected components. A simple methodology is proposed for calculating the solar radiation on vertical surfaces, based on a solar impact factor (SIF). Monthly means and daily totals of hourly sums for each month of the year are discussed. The hourly data of solar radiation for a typical day for each month of the year are presented. The data were generated for the four climatic zones of Saudi Arabia, the hot-dry (Riyadh), the warm-humid (Jeddah), the maritime inland desert climate (Dhahran) and the upland climate zone (Taif). The accuracy of the results is discussed and found to be above 90% representative.     

Energy conservation measures on residential buildings in Saudi Arabia

The effect of energy conservation measures for a typical two-storey residential building in Saudi Arabia are studied. The analysis shows that insulating the walls and the roof (15 mm-thick insulation) results in a significant reduction in the peak cooling load (>23%) and the annual energy consumption (>27%). Hence, a significant saving in customer and government equivalent uniform annual cost (EUAC) will be observed. The effects of additional measures, such as reducing the glazing area and the infiltration rate, are also reported.     

Wind power resource assessment for Rafha,Saudi Arabia

This paper, presents the analysis of wind speed data and available energy in Rafha area using wind machines of 600, 1000 and 1500 kW sizes from three manufacturers. The long-term annual mean values of wind speeds were found to vary between a minimum of 2.5 m/s in the year 2002 and a maximum of 4.9 m/s in 1990. The frequency distribution showed that wind remained silent for 7% of the time on an average during 24 years of data period and 35% between 0 and 3.5 m/s. Wind speed remained above 3.5 m/s for 65% of the time and only 20% of the times above 6.5 m/s. The annual wind energy production and plant capacity factors, obtained using different methods and wind machines of three sizes and from three manufacturers are also discussed and compared.     

The cost of domestic energy prices to Saudi Arabia

The issue of subsidies on domestic energy prices has moved up the policy agenda, most recently as a result of the G20 commitment in September 2009 to phase out such subsidies. However, what constitutes a “subsidy” is complex and controversial. The IEA in its last World Energy Outlook claimed that Saudi Arabia was second in the world in terms of its levels of subsidy on domestic energy prices. However, because Saudi Arabia is a price maker in the international oil market, the methodology used by the IEA is seriously flawed. This paper explains the problems with the methodology for computing subsidies and explains the correct method in the case of Saudi Arabia. It then attempts to measure the levels of subsidy in Saudi Arabia using this methodology. However, while it converts the IEA's “subsidy” of $23 billion into a net “profit” of $5.7 billion, it goes on to point out that the current low price regime is causing problems for Saudi Arabia.     

Weibull parameters for wind speed distribution in Saudi Arabia

The shape and scale parameters of a Weibull density distribution function are calculated for 10 locations in Saudi Arabia. The daily mean wind speed data from 1970 to mid-1990 are used for this purpose. It is found that the numerical values of the shape parameter vary between 1.7 and 2.7, whereas the value of the scale parameter is found to vary between 3 and 6. It is also concluded from this study that wind data are very well represented by the Weibull distribution function.