BEACon Radar Lights Up Westermost Rough

DONG Energy recently started receiving three-dimensional data collected by the BEACon radar on the wind flow at the 210MW Westermost Rough offshore wind farm on England’s east coast. 

The advanced radar system was installed by DONG Energy and SmartWind Technologies and it is the first of its kind in the world.

“This is a huge step forward for wind insights,” said Nicolai Gayle Nygaard, BEACon Technical Manager at DONG Energy.

“We’re getting minute-by-minute 3D images of the wind flow through the wind power plant. This is a game changer for the industry. We’re no longer limited to measuring the wind at just one point, now we can document the wind field across the entire wind power plant and coastal domain. Conventional measurement technologies are like using a torch in a dark room – you have a limited view. With the new radars, the entire room is flooded with light. We get new insights that provide valuable information for the design and operation of future wind power plants.”

Texas-based SmartWind Technologies has developed and deployed the BEACon radar system.

John Schroeder, Co-Founder of SmartWind Technologies, said: “SmartWind Technologies has provided an advanced hardware and software solution to measure the complex flows at the Westermost Rough wind power plant and to reduce the generated complex data fields into a user-friendly format. The acquired data will facilitate long-term studies and aid real-time decision-making. Application of this new capability will undoubtedly drive down the cost of wind energy, and we’re proud to help DONG Energy achieve this goal.”

While the measurement campaign has just begun, the initial data is providing a wealth of detail on how the Westermost Rough wind turbine array interacts with the evolving wind field, DONG said. Every week, the radars collect so much data that the information volume exceeds Wikipedia in size.