Synoptic and sub-synoptic circulation effects on wind resource variability – A case study from a coastal terrain setting in New Zealand

Abstract

a b s t r a c tThis paper investigates linkages between synoptic and sub-synoptic scale atmospheric circulation and temporal wind resource variability, adopting a synoptic weather typing approach. These linkages were examined in a complex terrain, coastal setting in southern New Zealand. Over a 28 month period, approximately 71% of the intermonthly variability in power density was explained by the monthly frequency of a subset of weather types. Within this subset, weather types associated with strong southwest or west orientated pressure gradients were related to enhanced power density, whereas weather types associated with stagnant pressure gradients were related to reduced power density. At the subsynoptic scale, the effect of the sea breeze on the wind resource was found to be of importance but dependent on both the season and the ambient larger scale atmospheric circulation. Aspects of the sea breeze circulation also appear to be complicated by additional thermal and dynamical influences associated with the larger scale terrain complexity. Similar wind regimes likely occur elsewhere and should be examined specifically in the context of the wind resource.

Regional Variability in New Zealand’s Wind Resource Linked to Synoptic-Scale Circulation: Implications for Generation Reliability

“…A lack of benefit has been reported for aggregating wind farms in the United Kingdom (e.g., Oswald et al 2008). Another important factor (but beyond the scope of this study) likely relates to New Zealand's terrain complexity (e.g., Gibson and Cullen 2015), whereby the influence of the associated local-scale flows may act to reduce wind speed correlations between stations, as shown by Santos-Alamillos et al (2014) in Spain. However, in the present study for New Zealand (a nation in which both islands are also oriented roughly perpendicular to the west-east propagation of synoptic systems), our correlation results imply that geographical orientation is not itself detrimental to observing the benefits of aggregating wind farms.…”

The Impact of Global Warming on Wind Energy Resources and Ramp Events in Japan

“…Generally, synoptic WPs associated with large-scale circulation are important to our understanding of wind energy generation and variability as they affect the statistics of wind speeds near the surface [35][36][37]. For example, there are clear relationships between wind power variability and classified WPs [11,36]. Previous studies suggest that wind energy generation varies with various meteorological phenomena, such as the evolution of synoptic-scale weather systems, at all scales.…”

Statistical and synoptic analyses of offshore wind variations

“…The findings presented here suggest that the variability of atmospheric circulation for wind speeds outside the range of wind power generation (e.g., lower than cut‐in speed or higher than cut‐out speed) is relatively small between all buoy locations except at B181, which has an interior location comparing with the other buoys. The variability of the atmospheric circulation between interior and offshore locations suggests that a wind farm placed at an interior location within the coastal mountain, such as a channel, can be used as a complement to another farm placed offshore, thus reducing the impacts of wind variability on the overall wind power generation (Gibson and Cullen, ). Annual average wind speed for all buoys (Table ) is equal to or greater than 7 m/s, which considered the lower bound of average wind speed for developing utility scale offshore wind farms (Schwartz et al ., ), suggesting that all locations considered in this study are suitable for wind development in terms of annual average wind speed.…”

“…Such a synoptic analysis is important from a climatological point of view as it provides better understanding of weather conditions that are associated with cessation of wind power generation. It also provides an opportunity to investigate the links between meteorology, climate variability, and wind resource assessment, thus building a connection between climatologists and wind energy industry by examining the linkage between atmospheric circulation and wind resource variability (Gibson and Cullen, ). Spatial variability of high wind speed between all buoy locations is investigated with a focus on three reference locations.…”