RETScreen is a pre-feasibility software package, which enables users to assess energy production, costs and financial viability of renewable energy projects anywhere in the world.

The package currently provides for evaluation of eight renewable energy technologies through a series of modules, which run within the main Excel-based program. The PV-specific module can assist with technical and economic analyses of grid-connected projects, ranging from centralized plants to smaller-scale distributed applications. The tool can also be used to determine radiation data in the plane of the array based on known horizontal insolation data.

The latest version of the software incorporates a link to NASA's Solar Energy Data Website to allow retrieval of insolation and near-surface air temperature data for any location world-wide. An integrated on-line database of renewable energy products provides information such as product specifications and performance data on equipment that may be used in the project, enabling comparison of alternative components.

The program, which is the work of Canada's CANMET Energy Diversification Research Laboratory (CEDRL) with input from many international renewable energy experts, can be downloaded free of charge from http://www.retscreen.gc.ca.

Information
For further information contact

• CEDRL
  Fax: +1 450 652 5177.

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