Are full data available for current date?

#1

Firstly I would like to sincerely express my appreciation for the great work of the Solcast API. Fantastic job!

I am currently developing a simple iOS APP, which is intended to show a forecast of PV output for distributed PV systems, as just a personal hobby for now. This API and data are truly a wonderful resource!

Here I also have one question/request:

Whenever I query, the data always starts from next half-hour o’clock. In this case if a user requests during the middle of the day, he/she won’t be able to get a full forecast/estimation of the day, right? Instead the user could only retrieve partial data for current date. I am wondering is it possible to retrieve full data of entire present day (from 12:00AM to 11:30PM), regardless whenever the request is sent.

Thank you again for your nice work and help. I am looking forward to your reply.

#2

A forecast at a particular time gives you 7 day forecast of values. Values farther in the future will be less accurate as the data is dependent on the quality and accuracy of the input weather conditions and weather prediction, the case of a sudden storm system 6 days in advance could be missed by the predictions. For a single day though the accuracy should be of high quality.

This rough Map Demo with Forecast Table will give you some guidance on data results

#3

For previous data it is no longer a forecasted value, but an actual value so to achieve what you are looking for you may have to do 2 requests 1 for forecast at the time you are and another for the actual values that were recorded looking back

This is detailed under this PV Power -

PV Estimated Actuals - https://api.solcast.com.au/pv_power/estimated_actuals?longitude=149.117&latitude=-35.277&capacity=1000&api_key=<YOUR_KEY>&format=json (For previous actual data from request time)

PV Forecast = https://api.solcast.com.au/pv_power/forecasts?longitude=149.117&latitude=-35.277&capacity=1000&api_key=<YOUR_KEY>&format=json (For forecasted values from request time)

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#4

Hi siliconrob,

This well addressed my question. Thank you so much and I’ll give it a try.

#5

Hi siliconrob,

I have just tried the “estimated_actuals” but couldn’t retrieve any data, meanwhile “forecasts” worked well for the same location. Do I need another API key for “estimated_actuals”? Thanks a lot.

#6

First you do not need a different key to make estimated_actuals requests. Second coverage is not 100% over the entire world so it would be best if you used some common working reference points when testing and if you have trouble reply with the lat/lng in particular that is not giving you results.

Disclosure: I work for Solcast so I tried your API key with a sample estimated_actuals API call and it returned the proper data.

Remember to put your API key in and it will be 32 characters in length. The following snippets replace the

01234567890123456789012345678901

with your API key and copy paste the url into the browser of your choice or construct a curl request

This is my request for Shanghai area

https://api.solcast.com.au/pv_power/estimated_actuals?longitude=121.4737&latitude=31.23&capacity=1000&format=json&api_key=01234567890123456789012345678901

This is my request for Deqen area

https://api.solcast.com.au/pv_power/estimated_actuals?longitude=99.7023&latitude=27.8188&capacity=1000&format=json&api_key=01234567890123456789012345678901

Results will look like this

	{  
	   "estimated_actuals":[  
		  {  
			 "period_end":"2017-12-21T09:30:00.0000000Z",
			 "period":"PT30M",
			 "pv_estimate":384.230119664323
		  },
		  {  
			 "period_end":"2017-12-21T09:00:00.0000000Z",
			 "period":"PT30M",
			 "pv_estimate":485.455082054387
		  },
		  ...
	}
#7

Hi siliconrob,

Thank you so much for looking into this. I can now parson both forecasts and estimated_actuals data. However it seems there still are a few hours of data missing. For instance:

  1. If I use “forecasts”, the time stamp starts from “2017-12-22T07:00” - which is exactly current time and it is correct.
    {“forecasts”:[
    {“period_end”:“2017-12-22T07:00:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:476.302053795232},{“period_end”:“2017-12-22T07:30:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:395.53686977719},{“period_end”:“2017-12-22T08:00:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:308.218501671742}, …

  2. If I use “estimated_actuals” query at the same time, the time stamp starts from “2017-12-22T00:30” and backwards.
    {“estimated_actuals”:[
    {“period_end”:“2017-12-22T00:30:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:176.351976084993},{“period_end”:“2017-12-22T00:00:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:62.4942843762166},{“period_end”:“2017-12-21T23:30:00.0000000Z”,“period”:“PT30M”,“pv_estimate”:16.4410935995282},…

So there are about 6 hours of data missing, between “2017-12-22T00:30” to “2017-12-22T07:00”. Is my understanding correct or I miss something here?

Thanks a lot for your great help!

#8

If you want the latest estimated_actuals you can add latest to the API call. This is listed in the swagger reference documentation.

https://api.solcast.com.au/pv_power/estimated_actuals/latest?longitude=121.4737&latitude=31.23&capacity=1000&format=json&api_key=012345678901234567890123456789012

I think you should be able to query this, but if you could verify. If you are unable it may be due to the user role you are in. The data itself will be no different than the current estimated_actuals resultset, so you can continue building your application with the current estimated_actuals API call

#9

Hi siliconrob,

This is working well right now. Thank you!

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