An actinometer is an instrument that can measure the heating power of radiation. Actinometers are used in meteorology to measure solar radiation as pyranometers, pyrheliometers and net radiometers.
An actinometer is a chemical system or physical device which determines the number of photons in a beam integrally or per unit time. This name is commonly applied to devices used in the ultraviolet and visible wavelength ranges. For example, solutions of iron(III) oxalate can be used as a chemical actinometer, while bolometers, thermopiles, and photodiodes are physical devices giving a reading that can be correlated to the number of photons detected.