SPIRIT: Short-term Prediction of solar IRradIance for zero-shot Transfer learning using Foundation Models
This addresses the need for accurate solar forecasting to manage renewable energy grids, particularly for newer installations, though it is incremental as it builds on existing foundation model concepts.
The paper tackles the problem of solar irradiance forecasting for new photovoltaic farms lacking historical data by proposing SPIRIT, a foundation model-based approach that achieves about 70% better performance in zero-shot transfer learning compared to state-of-the-art models.
Traditional solar forecasting models are based on several years of site-specific historical irradiance data, often spanning five or more years, which are unavailable for newer photovoltaic farms. As renewable energy is highly intermittent, building accurate solar irradiance forecasting systems is essential for efficient grid management and enabling the ongoing proliferation of solar energy, which is crucial to achieve the United Nations' net zero goals. In this work, we propose SPIRIT, a novel approach leveraging foundation models for solar irradiance forecasting, making it applicable to newer solar installations. Our approach outperforms state-of-the-art models in zero-shot transfer learning by about 70%, enabling effective performance at new locations without relying on any historical data. Further improvements in performance are achieved through fine-tuning, as more location-specific data becomes available. These findings are supported by statistical significance, further validating our approach. SPIRIT represents a pivotal step towards rapid, scalable, and adaptable solar forecasting solutions, advancing the integration of renewable energy into global power systems.