IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v16y2023i16p5941-d1215389.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Large-Eddy Simulation of Utility-Scale Wind Farm Sited over Complex Terrain

Author

Listed:
  • Jagdeep Singh

    (Interdisciplinary Scientific Computing Program, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL A1C 5S7, Canada
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

  • Jahrul M Alam

    (Interdisciplinary Scientific Computing Program, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL A1C 5S7, Canada
    Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL A1C 5S7, Canada
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

Abstract

The realm of wind energy is a rapidly expanding renewable energy technology. Wind farm developers need to understand the interaction between wind farms and the atmospheric flow over complex terrain. Large-eddy simulations provide valuable data for gaining further insight into the impact of rough topography on wind farm performance. In this article, we report the influence of spatial heterogeneity on wind turbine performance. We conducted numerical simulations of a 12 × 5 wind turbine array over various rough topographies. First, we evaluated our large-eddy simulation method through a mesh convergence analysis, using mean vertical profiles, vertical friction velocity, and resolved and subgrid-scale kinetic energy. Next, we analyzed the effects of surface roughness and dispersive stresses on the performance of fully developed large wind farms. Our results show that the ground roughness element’s flow resistance boosts the power production of large wind farms by almost 68% over an aerodynamically rough surface compared with flat terrain. The dispersive stress analysis revealed that the primary degree of spatial heterogeneity in wind farms is in the streamwise direction, which is the “wake-occupied” region, and the relative contribution of dispersive shear stress to the overall drag may be about 45%. Our observation reveals that the power performance of the wind farm in complex terrain surpasses the drag effect. Our study has implications for improving the design of wind turbines and wind farms in complex terrain to increase their efficiency and energy output.

Suggested Citation

  • Jagdeep Singh & Jahrul M Alam, 2023. "Large-Eddy Simulation of Utility-Scale Wind Farm Sited over Complex Terrain," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(16), pages 1-26, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:16:y:2023:i:16:p:5941-:d:1215389
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/16/5941/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/16/5941/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stevens, Richard J.A.M. & Martínez-Tossas, Luis A. & Meneveau, Charles, 2018. "Comparison of wind farm large eddy simulations using actuator disk and actuator line models with wind tunnel experiments," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 116(PA), pages 470-478.
    2. Wu, Yu-Ting & Porté-Agel, Fernando, 2015. "Modeling turbine wakes and power losses within a wind farm using LES: An application to the Horns Rev offshore wind farm," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 945-955.
    3. Yang, Xiaolei & Pakula, Maggie & Sotiropoulos, Fotis, 2018. "Large-eddy simulation of a utility-scale wind farm in complex terrain," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 229(C), pages 767-777.
    4. Nicolas Tobin & Leonardo P. Chamorro, 2017. "Windbreak Effects Within Infinite Wind Farms," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-12, August.
    5. Shyuan Cheng & Mahmoud Elgendi & Fanghan Lu & Leonardo P. Chamorro, 2021. "On the Wind Turbine Wake and Forest Terrain Interaction," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-13, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhaobin Li & Xiaohao Liu & Xiaolei Yang, 2022. "Review of Turbine Parameterization Models for Large-Eddy Simulation of Wind Turbine Wakes," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(18), pages 1-28, September.
    2. Yunliang Li & Zhaobin Li & Zhideng Zhou & Xiaolei Yang, 2023. "Large-Eddy Simulation of Wind Turbine Wakes in Forest Terrain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(6), pages 1-23, March.
    3. Wang, Qiang & Luo, Kun & Yuan, Renyu & Wang, Shuai & Fan, Jianren & Cen, Kefa, 2020. "A multiscale numerical framework coupled with control strategies for simulating a wind farm in complex terrain," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 203(C).
    4. Zehtabiyan-Rezaie, Navid & Abkar, Mahdi, 2024. "An extended k−ɛ model for wake-flow simulation of wind farms," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 222(C).
    5. Dou, Bingzheng & Guala, Michele & Lei, Liping & Zeng, Pan, 2019. "Experimental investigation of the performance and wake effect of a small-scale wind turbine in a wind tunnel," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 819-833.
    6. Rivera-Arreba, Irene & Li, Zhaobin & Yang, Xiaolei & Bachynski-Polić, Erin E., 2024. "Comparison of the dynamic wake meandering model against large eddy simulation for horizontal and vertical steering of wind turbine wakes," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 221(C).
    7. Purohit, Shantanu & Ng, E.Y.K. & Syed Ahmed Kabir, Ijaz Fazil, 2022. "Evaluation of three potential machine learning algorithms for predicting the velocity and turbulence intensity of a wind turbine wake," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 405-420.
    8. Eidi, Ali & Ghiassi, Reza & Yang, Xiang & Abkar, Mahdi, 2021. "Model-form uncertainty quantification in RANS simulations of wakes and power losses in wind farms," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 2212-2223.
    9. Hegazy, Amr & Blondel, Frédéric & Cathelain, Marie & Aubrun, Sandrine, 2022. "LiDAR and SCADA data processing for interacting wind turbine wakes with comparison to analytical wake models," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 181(C), pages 457-471.
    10. Andrés Guggeri & Martín Draper, 2019. "Large Eddy Simulation of an Onshore Wind Farm with the Actuator Line Model Including Wind Turbine’s Control below and above Rated Wind Speed," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-21, September.
    11. Zhang, Jincheng & Zhao, Xiaowei, 2020. "A novel dynamic wind farm wake model based on deep learning," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 277(C).
    12. Fan, Shuanglong & Liu, Zhenqing, 2023. "Proposal of fully-coupled actuated disk model for wind turbine operation modeling in turbulent flow field due to complex topography," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 284(C).
    13. Dhiman, Harsh S. & Deb, Dipankar & Foley, Aoife M., 2020. "Bilateral Gaussian Wake Model Formulation for Wind Farms: A Forecasting based approach," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    14. Tristan Revaz & Fernando Porté-Agel, 2021. "Large-Eddy Simulation of Wind Turbine Flows: A New Evaluation of Actuator Disk Models," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-22, June.
    15. Dhiman, Harsh S. & Deb, Dipankar & Foley, Aoife M., 2020. "Lidar assisted wake redirection in wind farms: A data driven approach," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 484-493.
    16. Zhang, Ziyu & Huang, Peng & Bitsuamlak, Girma & Cao, Shuyang, 2024. "Large-eddy simulation of upwind-hill effects on wind-turbine wakes and power performance," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 294(C).
    17. Pin Lyu & Wen-Li Chen & Hui Li & Lian Shen, 2019. "A Numerical Study on the Development of Self-Similarity in a Wind Turbine Wake Using an Improved Pseudo-Spectral Large-Eddy Simulation Solver," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-24, February.
    18. Cao, Lichao & Ge, Mingwei & Gao, Xiaoxia & Du, Bowen & Li, Baoliang & Huang, Zhi & Liu, Yongqian, 2022. "Wind farm layout optimization to minimize the wake induced turbulence effect on wind turbines," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 323(C).
    19. Abutunis, A. & Taylor, G. & Fal, M. & Chandrashekhara, K., 2020. "Experimental evaluation of coaxial horizontal axis hydrokinetic composite turbine system," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 232-245.
    20. Kale, Baris & Buckingham, Sophia & van Beeck, Jeroen & Cuerva-Tejero, Alvaro, 2023. "Comparison of the wake characteristics and aerodynamic response of a wind turbine under varying atmospheric conditions using WRF-LES-GAD and WRF-LES-GAL wind turbine models," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:16:y:2023:i:16:p:5941-:d:1215389. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.