Low‐cost wind resource assessment for small‐scale turbine installations using site pre‐screening and short‐term wind measurements

Abstract

A two-stage approach to low-cost wind resource assessment for small-scale wind installations has been investigated in terms of its ability to screen for non-viable sites and to provide accurate wind power predictions at promising locations. The approach was implemented as a case study at ten UK locations where domestic-scale turbines were previously installed. In stage one, sites were pre-screened using a boundary layer scaling model to predict the mean wind power density, including estimated uncertainties, and these predictions were compared to a minimum viability criterion. Using this procedure, five of the seven non-viable sites were correctly identified without direct onsite wind measurements and none of the viable sites were excluded. In stage two, more detailed analysis was carried out using three months onsite wind measurements combined with measure-correlate-predict (MCP) approaches. Using this process, the remaining two non-viable sites were identified and the available wind power density at the three viable sites was accurately predicted. The effect of seasonal variability on the MCP predicted wind resource was considered and the implications for financial projections were highlighted. The study provides a framework for low-cost wind resource assessment in cases where long-term onsite measurements may be too costly or impractical.2

A review of sensitivity analysis practices in wind resource assessment

“…Once WS data are fitted to a DM, WP can be assessed. Both GSA [35] [35] performed GSA of WP density of a small-scale onshore WT in the UK with the Sobol method using GUI-HDMR [51]. The SAIVs were regional displacement height, roughness length (RL), blending height, and W2 shape factor.…”

“…The relationship between the WS and WP is known to be cubical (8) [25], so whenever the WS or its DM parameters are present among SAOVs, OAT is not acceptable. Numerous attempts at quantifying the uncertainty in WP associated with the WS were made [35]- [45][44], some -with OATSA [43][45] [44]. He et al [45] sharply observed that all relationships between SAIVs (WS threshold, slope threshold, elevation threshold, and bathymetry threshold) and the SAOV were nonlinear, but used OATSA nonetheless.…”

A Variable-Structure Multi-Resonant DC–DC Converter with Smooth Switching

“…ω s = 2πf s is the angular frequency of the operating frequency f s . Equations (5)- (7) show the corresponding expressions of these three resonant points. If the imaginary part V ImC is set to zero, the expressions of resonant points f C1 and f C3 can be acquired, as shown in Equations (5) and 7, respectively.…”

“…Wind power, as an important form of new energy power generation, has attracted much attention [1][2][3][4]. Compared to the large and medium-scale wind power generation systems (WPGSs) [5], small-scale WPGSs have the advantages of lower cost, more flexible installation and a higher utilization rate of wind energy [6][7][8][9]. Moreover, they can be divided into off-grid and grid-connected WPGSs [10].…”

Acoustic Noise of Axial Flux Permanent Magnet Generators in Locally Manufactured Small Wind Turbines

“…LMSWTs are typically part of hybrid off-grid systems, with installed capacity of renewable energy sources of up to 10 kW, while their rotor diameters range from 1.2 to 6 m, producing power from 200 W to 5 kW, respectively, at 10 m/s wind speeds. These small wind turbines are typically direct drive, unlike larger small wind turbines [11] which utilise a gearbox, variable speed machines which consist of a three blade wooden [12,13] horizontal axis rotor of constant pitch angle, of a coreless axial flux permanent-magnet generator (AFPMG) [14] with a double rotor single stator configuration and utilise a passive gravity furling tail system for rotor speed regulation. The use of AFPMGs is typical for these small-scale wind energy applications [15][16][17], mostly due to the simple manufacturing techniques required for constructing the stator and the rotor of the machine.…”