The Carbon Trust Chooses Windar LiDARs for New Project

The Carbon Trust has selected Windar Photonics to supply LiDARs for a new project launched as part of the Offshore Wind Accelerator (OWA) programme.

Windar will supply eight WindEYE sensors to be installed on offshore turbines as part of The Carbon Trust’s EUR 2.3 million wind farm control trials (WFCT), designed to demonstrate how effective implementation of control strategies can reduce the cost of offshore wind.

The project, supported by EnBW, E.ON, innogy, Statoil and Vattenfall, will investigate the impact of focusing on strategies that aim to improve energy generation across an entire wind farm, rather than individual turbines and help to lower the levelised cost of energy (LCoE).

“I am delighted that Windar has been selected to supply WindEYE™ sensors to such a significant project backed by major industry players. We are confident the project will focus industry attention on the multiple benefits of our WindEYE™ systems, from increasing wind energy yield, reducing turbine fatigue, lowering operational and maintenance costs and ultimately reducing the levelised cost of energy for energy producers,” Jørgen Korsgaard Jensen, Chief Executive Officer at Windar, said.

The WFCT intends to demonstrate a lower LCoE by increasing the total wind energy yield and reducing fatigue, therefore saving O&M costs, while also increasing the availability and lifetime of existing and future assets, as well as by implementing wind farm control strategies, including turbine nacelle mounted LiDARs, Windar said.

James Sinfield, Manager at The Carbon Trust, said: “The project has the potential to have a significant impact on cost reduction with a win-win on improving annual energy production and at the same time reducing operational and maintenance costs.”

The programme is expected to be undertaken in 2018 with full results expected during 2019.

OWA, The Carbon Trust’s collaborative R&D programme with nine offshore wind developers, was set up in 2008. Over the past nine years, the programme has delivered nearly 150 projects, ranging from feasibility studies to multi-million pound, full-scale technology demonstrations. The projects undertaken by the OWA programme are selected to impact the LCoE by improving performance in offshore wind farm design, construction and operation.