An integrated approach for wind farms
The CLUSTERDESIGN (A toolbox for offshore wind farm cluster design) project has created a toolbox to facilitate this integrated approach. This was achieved through a combination of advanced wake models, turbine load models and grid interconnection models, and by incorporating the operation of the offshore clusters as a virtual offshore power plant. Project partners carried out extensive measurements and data collection to validate the models and to calibrate them and further improve them. This resulted in accurate projections of the energy production once the interaction between wake losses and electrical losses was taken into account. Control mechanisms for virtual offshore power plants were tested in an operational large wind farm in the North Sea to verify an increase in overall energy yield. Researchers also tested the reduction of the load on the individual turbines and the flexible operation of the wind farm clusters. Results included the improvement of models and a greater understanding of wake interactions. Other benefits involved reduced costs through reduced loads, maximum energy extraction and less uncertainty with regard to energy yield predictions. CLUSTERDESIGN will also support further development of the exploitation of offshore wind energy as required under the European Strategic Energy Technology Plan. Moreover, it will help reduce the levelized cost of electricity, whereby a system's expected lifetime costs are divided by the system's expected lifetime power output.
Keywords
Wind farms, wind farm clusters, CLUSTERDESIGN, offshore power plant, wake interactions
