Air mass (solar energy)
The air mass coefficient defines the direct optical path length through the Earth's atmosphere, expressed as a ratio relative to the path length vertically upwards, i.e. at the zenith. The air mass coefficient can be used to help characterize the solar spectrum after solar radiation has traveled through the atmosphere. The air mass coefficient is commonly used to characterize the performance of solar cells under standardized conditions, and is often referred to using the syntax "AM" followed by a number. "AM1.5" is almost universal when characterizing terrestrial power-generating panels.
Solar radiation closely matches a black body radiator at about 5,800 K. As it passes through the atmosphere, sunlight is attenuated by scattering and absorption; the more atmosphere through which it passes, the greater the attenuation.
As the sunlight travels through the atmosphere, chemicals interact with the sunlight and absorb certain wavelengths. The amount of short-wavelength light reaching the Earth's surface. A more active component of this process is water vapor, which results in a wide variety of absorption bands at many wavelengths, while molecular nitrogen, oxygen and carbon dioxide add to this process. By the time it reaches the Earth's surface, the spectrum is strongly confined between the far infrared and near ultraviolet.
Atmospheric scattering plays a role in removing higher frequencies from direct sunlight and scattering it about the sky. This is why the sky appears blue and the sun yellow — more of the higher-frequency blue light arrives at the observer via indirect scattered paths; and less blue light follows the direct path, giving the sun a yellow tinge. The greater the distance in the atmosphere through which the sunlight travels, the greater this effect, which is why the sun looks orange or red at dawn and sundown when the sunlight is travelling very obliquely through the atmosphere — progressively more of the blues and greens are removed from the direct rays, giving an orange or red appearance to the sun; and the sky appears pink — because the blues and greens are scattered over such long paths that they are highly attenuated before arriving at the observer, resulting in characteristic pink skies at dawn and sunset.
For a path length through the atmosphere, for solar radiation incident at angle relative to the normal to the Earth's surface, the air mass coefficient is:
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