Faculty Profiles

Professor Kleissl researches the interaction of weather with engineering systems, in particular buildings and their energy use, solar power systems, and irrigated lands. Professor Jan Kleissl is the Primary Investigator (PI) of DER Connect. This NSF-funded testbed is being built to allow universities, utilities, and industry leaders to achieve a better understanding of how to integrate renewable energy resources into the power grid. DER Connect will allow universities, utilities, and industry leaders to achieve a better understanding of how to integrate renewable energy resources into the power grid. 

Kleissl developed the first building energy use model that is coupled with weather processes in the urban canyon and urban fluid mechanics through large eddy simulation. This models can be used to study the impact of urban surfaces on human comfort and energy use. For example, even though artificial turf get very hot in the sun, it was found to reduce energy use of nearby buildings due to a reduction of window transmission of solar radiation. Kleissl is also an expert on solar resource assessment and forecasting and is co-director of the California Solar Energy Collaborative and Vice-Chair of the American Solar Energy Society resource applications division. Using high frequency solar irradiance measurements and whole sky imagery, Kleissl's research group has developed cloud tracking and intra-hour solar forecasting models. These models are expected to be critical to facilitate economical integration of large amounts of solar power into the electric grid.

Capsule Bio:

Jan Kleissl received a Ph.D. in 2004 from Johns Hopkins University and was a postdoctoral fellow at Michigan Technological University from January 2004 to October 2005. He was a postdoctoral fellow at New Mexico Tech from October 2005 until he joined UC San Diego in November 2006.