Wind Farm Wake-Steering Exploration During Grid Curtailment

Abstract

Wind farm wake steering is an active topic in the wind community. Yaw-induced wake steering in wind farms has shown significant increases in total wind farm power output. Unfortunately, sensor uncertainty and model uncertainty often make pure model-driven approaches less effective. Due to the mechanical and financial downsides associated with experimental wake steering, collecting useful data to verify model-based approaches is often viewed as too risky. However, electric grid curtailment periods offer the opportunity to experiment with minimal mechanical and financial risks. A novel data acquisition process is presented that utilizes grid curtailment periods for wake steering experimentation. This method curtails the total wind farm power output while yaw sweeping the upstream turbine to discover the optimal yaw angle for wake-steering. The optimal yaw angle can then be used in regular uncurtailed periods to increase total power output.