The C-Power wind farm, also known as the Thornton Bank offshore wind farm, was running at full speed in December, January and February and produced 29% more energy than expected.
Exceptionally favourable wind conditions and the high technical reliability of the wind farm led to this power production record, C-Power says.
The 54 wind turbines, which are positioned 30 kilometres out to sea, already produced 17% more electricity in December. In January and February however, all records were broken with a production of 290 GWh or 35% more than expected. In these three months, the wind farm produced the equivalent of the annual energy consumption of 120.000 families.
This production is 2.6 times higher than the production in months with extremely poor wind conditions such as July, August and September 2013. This is explained by a high technical availability, high average wind speeds and the fact that during those two winter months, wind speeds only fell below 20 km/h on 8 days.
From December to February, there were 13 stormy days with average wind speeds exceeding 80 km/h. These powerful turbines are only discontinued for safety reasons when the wind reaches speeds of 108 km/h or more for 10 minutes. Such high speeds were not reached, so all wind turbines always continued to run at full speed, according to C-Power.
Press release, March 7, 2014; Image: © C-Power nv. photographer Tom D’Haenens