—————————————————————————————————— WIND RESOURCE ASSESSMENT IN AUSTRALIA – A PLANNERS GUIDE Coppin, P.A., Ayotte, K.A., Steggel, N. Wind Energy Research Unit CSIRO Land and Water Version 1.1, October 2003 CSIRO Wind Energy Research Unit ©2003 The lead Commonwealth agency on greenhouse matters Acknowledgement CSIRO gratefully acknowledges the Commonwealth Government funding received through the Australian Greenhouse Office in the support of this project Important Disclaimer To the extent permitted by law, CSIRO Land and Water (including its employees and consultants) excludes all liability to any person for any consequences, including but not limited to all losses, damages, costs, expenses and any other compensation, arising directly or indirectly from using this publication (in part or in whole) and any information or material contained in it. 2 Table of Contents 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................9 2 The Key Steps To Wind Farm Resource Calculations ..........................................11 3 Climatology -Wind Characteristics in Australia...................................................13 3.1 Geographic Distribution....................................................................................... 13 3.2 Large–scale Effects .............................................................................................. 13 3.3 Design Implications.............................................................................................. 14 3.4 Time of Year and Time of Day Variations........................................................... 15 3.5 Inter-annual Variability & Variation with Location .......................................... 16 3.6 Available Data Sources ........................................................................................ 18 3.6.1 Bureau of meteorology data ................................................... 18 3.6.2 Historical surveys and wind atlases...................................... 18 3.6.3 High resolution maps and on site data.................................. 19 4 Local effects on the wind.......................................................................................23 4.1 Variation with Height and Surface Cover –the Wind Profile ............................ 23 4.2 Topographic Speedup ........................................................................................... 24 4.3 Thermal Effects and Funnelling.......................................................................... 25 4.4 Turbulence Generation and Gusts ...................................................................... 26 4.5 Shelter and Obstacles .......................................................................................... 27 4.6 Example of Local Effects...................................................................................... 27 4.7 The Area of Wind Available at a Given Resource Level..................................... 28 5 Measuring the wind ..............................................................................................30 5.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 30 5.2 Indirect Indicators................................................................................................ 30 5.3 Direct Measurements........................................................................................... 31 5.4 Location ................................................................................................................ 32 5.5 Height of Measurement ....................................................................................... 33 5.6 Type of Masts ....................................................................................................... 34 5.7 Instrument Placement ......................................................................................... 35 5.8 Instrumentation ................................................................................................... 36 5.8.1 Types of instruments.............................................................. 36 3 5.8.2 Response characteristics ........................................................ 37 5.8.3 Calibrations ............................................................................ 37 5.9 Measurement Schemes ........................................................................................ 38 5.10 Data Series Extension (MCP)....................................................................... 39 5.11 Long-term Projection of Energy Yields ........................................................ 40 5.11.1 Data integrity ......................................................................... 41 5.11.2 Correlation techniques and quantification of accuracy ........ 44 6 Generating the power – turbines interacting with the wind ................................45 6.1 Turbine Response Relationship........................................................................... 45 6.2 Energy Yields ....................................................................................................... 45 6.3 Turbulence and Gusts.......................................................................................... 47 6.4 Wakes.................................................................................................................... 48 7 Modeling the Wind – Local Area...........................................................................49 7.1 A Historical View – The European Wind Atlas Analysis and Application Program - WASP..................................................................................... 49 7.2 The Statistical Nature of the Wind ..................................................................... 51 7.3 A View of Error in Modelling Wind Flow ............................................................ 52 7.4 Coherence ............................................................................................................. 53 7.5 Flow in Steep Terrain .......................................................................................... 55 7.6 Thermal Stratification ......................................................................................... 58 7.7 Summary .............................................................................................................. 59 8 Modelling the wind – Large Area..........................................................................61 8.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 61 8.2 Mesoscale Models ................................................................................................. 61 8.3 Combined Meso/Microscale Model Approaches .................................................. 63 8.3.1 WindScape system.................................................................. 63 8.3.2 Example wind mapping output.............................................. 64 8.4 Summary of Example Combined Mesoscale/Microscale Systems...................... 67 8.4.1 RISØ - KAMM/WASP.............................................................. 67 8.4.2 Truewind - MesoMap.............................................................. 68 8.4.3 CSIRO/WERU - WindScape® ................................................ 68 8.5 Recommended Usage of Model Output ............................................................... 69 8.6 Mapping Scale Issues........................................................................................... 70 9 Wind farm layout design.......................................................................................72 9.1 Principles .............................................................................................................. 72 4 9.2 Limitations ........................................................................................................... 72 9.3 Available systems................................................................................................. 73 9.3.1 WASP – Basic wind energy yield calculations ....................... 73 9.3.2 WindFarmer............................................................................ 73 9.3.3 WindFarm............................................................................... 74 9.3.4 WindPro .................................................................................. 74 10 References.............................................................................................................76 11 Appendix A - Windscape® Assessment Of Potential Wind Energy Yield In The Foster Region ...................................................................................................79 11.1 Background.................................................................................................... 79 11.2 Description of the area.................................................................................. 81 11.3 The WindScape® Approach ........................................................................... 82 11.3.1 WindScape system.................................................................. 82 11.3.2 Validating WindScape ............................................................ 83 11.4 Application of WindScape to the Foster region............................................ 84 11.4.1 Regional scale modelling ........................................................ 84 11.4.2 Fine scale