“Get Out of My Wind”

Abstract

When the wind passes the rotor blades of a wind turbine, the wind is swirled in the wake of a turbine and exhibits a large amount of turbulence. This has an impact on the turbines situated behind it on the wind farm. Shadowing caused by the wakes of wind turbines can result in a loss of energy output and can compromise the operational lifetime of the turbines. In the GW Wakes research project, the airflow across the wind farm and the wakes in Alpha Ventus and the larger Riffgat wind farm were measured using several lidar devices. The overall objective was to get a better understanding of the turbulent wind farm airflow in very large offshore wind farms through flow measurements and high-resolution simulations, to simulate the impacts on the turbines more accurately, and to develop engineering models so that the planning and operation of offshore wind farms can be improved.