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A significantly less expensive but comparatively accurate means of estimating solar radiation from satellite imagery is demonstrated. Opaque cloud cover is visually extracted from nondigitized, photographic forms of GOES satellite imagery and solar radiation is estimated using this information as input into a relatively simple solar model. Daily root mean square, mean absolute and mean bias errors were 13.2, 8.6 and 1.1 percent, respectively. Maps of the spatial distribution of solar radiation for Arizona are included.

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