Instructions in the link: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/ENGG1811/16s1/resources/2878
Assignment: Solar Position Calculator
Purpose - This assignment is designed to give you practice in
-Implementing a model based on well-defined mathematical principles.
-Testing functions before they're used in a wider context.
-Understanding the sometimes strange apparent position of the sun at geographic extremes.
-Manipulating data on sheets via named cells.
-Displaying graphical elements to help visualise a dynamic system.
-(Optional) Object animation using supplied move and delay procedures.
Executive Summary
-Implement algorithms (provided) to determine the position of the sun for any location on Earth at any date and time.
-Test your core functions using the supplied test sheet.
-Display the calculated solar position on a predrawn skymap.
-Display the daily solar path.
-Calculate sunrise and sunset times.
-Animate the sun icon over the daily path (not assessed).
Background
Solar angles are important in the design of buildings, solar panel alignments and solar-thermal power stations.
The position of the sun in the sky at any place and time is determined by complex physics, but good approximations (to within a fraction of a degree) are possible using fairly simple trigonometry. The key ingredients are
-Knowing where the Earth and sun are, on any date, with respect to each other; and
-Knowing where a point on the Earth is with respect to the sun, at any date and time.
We will be using the model that underlies the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's solar position calculator, which can be used to validate your answers.
High-accuracy equations for the sun/Earth relationship, have been implemented for you, in the NOAA module. Given a calendar date, supplied functions calculate two crucial values:
-The sun's declination, or position of the sun with respect to the plane of the Earth's equator.
-The equation of time, an value in minutes representing variations in the sun's position because the Earth's orbit is elliptical.