SHPNet: A Solar-Historical Prior Network with Similar Historical Windows for Ultra-Short-Term Multi-Step Photovoltaic Power Forecasting

Photovoltaic (PV) power exhibits high variability and non-stationarity due to irradiance fluctuations, cloud shading, and seasonal changes, which complicate ultra-short-term multi-step forecasting. This study proposes a Solar-Historical Prior Network (SHPNet) for forecasting at 5 min resolution. SHPNet integrates a solar-geometry clear-sky prior-guided temporal convolutional network (SGCP-TCN), a similar historical window (SHW) branch, and horizon-wise adaptive fusion (HA). SGCP-TCN estimates clear-sky power potential from site coordinates and timestamps and reformulates direct power prediction as clear-sky power ratio forecasting. SHW retrieves training windows from the same intra-day time slot that exhibit similar power–irradiance evolution, thereby constructing a non-parametric historical prior, while HA determines horizon-specific fusion weights based on validation errors. Unlike purely data-driven predictors and conventional similar-day methods, SHPNet combines a physically interpretable power scale with input-window-level historical evolution patterns and adaptively balances the two priors across forecasting horizons. Across the two sites, SHPNet reduced the mean MAE and RMSE by 14.07% and 10.26%, respectively, compared with the original TCN, while increasing the mean R2 from 0.8279 to 0.8613. Evaluations under different weather conditions and across seasons demonstrate consistent forecasting performance, while convergence analysis confirms stable training behavior.