Wind energy is the fastest growing renewable energy source and Europe remains at the forefront of the market. By 2020 it is predicted that between 12 and 14% of the EU’s electricity demand will be fulfilled by wind generated power – saving an amount of CO2 equivalent to taking 165 million cars off the roads. Measurements matter in wind energy as we seek new turbine locations and operational efficiencies. The starting point for expanding wind power capacity is identifying suitable new locations for turbine installations. There are available resources that give broad wind information for most areas and ‘wind prospecting’, as this process is sometimes called, often starts here.
For domestic and small commercial projects, the cost of instrumented pre-installation assessment is prohibitive and so, at this level, general wind data or data from nearby calibrated weather stations may be utilised instead, increasing the degree of uncertainty about the likely pay-back.
However, wind is notoriously fickle and site specific resource assessment surveys remain an absolute necessity for large and utility scale wind farm projects to ascertain the commercial viability of any potential site. Good measurements really do matter here as just a few percentage points of error can mean the difference between profit and loss on the installed project.
Wind resource assessment
Sites suitable for wind energy projects are often challenging environments. Onshore, physical access can be difficult and mains electricity and fixed line communication infrastructure are often not available; even mobile network coverage isn’t guaranteed. Offshore is worse still and the necessity for a boat or a helicopter makes access expensive. Very exposed, windy places do not provide ideal working conditions for the installers of measurement instrumentation.
For these reasons any weather monitoring system has to be simple to install and ideally pre-tested off-site beforehand. Once installed it needs a viable telecommunication platform and be reliable enough to operate autonomously 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
The three main technologies in use for such resource assessments are LIDAR, SODAR and traditional cup anemometry. Additionally some meteorological service providers offer personalised wind data for use in prospecting and resource assessment.
