Method for airborne measurement of the spatial wind speed distribution above complex terrain

Ingenhorst, Christian; Jacobs, Georg; Stößel, Laura; Schelenz, Ralf; Juretzki, Björn

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/wes-6-427-2021

Articles | Volume 6, issue 2

https://doi.org/10.5194/wes-6-427-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Special issue:

Wind Energy Science Conference 2019

https://doi.org/10.5194/wes-6-427-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 6, issue 2

Research article

|

18 Mar 2021

Research article |

| 18 Mar 2021

Method for airborne measurement of the spatial wind speed distribution above complex terrain

Christian Ingenhorst, Georg Jacobs, Laura Stößel, Ralf Schelenz, and Björn Juretzki

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Final revised paper (published on 18 Mar 2021)
Preprint (discussion started on 17 Mar 2020)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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RC1: 'Review', Anonymous Referee #1, 02 Apr 2020
- AC1: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #1', Christian Ingenhorst, 22 Apr 2020
RC2: 'Review of "Wind speed deviations in complex terrain" by C. Ingenhorst et al.', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Jul 2020
- AC2: 'Reply to Anonymous Referee #2', Christian Ingenhorst, 29 Jul 2020

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Christian Ingenhorst on behalf of the Authors (07 Oct 2020) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (08 Oct 2020) by Rebecca Barthelmie

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (03 Nov 2020)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

Ingenhorst et al. present a study about a multicopter equipped with a sonic anemometer to measure wind speed and wind direction at flexible points in space, and in particular in complex terrain. They introduce the system as a possible replacement for site assessment with CFD. Unfortunately I can not see the innovation in this study, since multicopters equipped with sonic anemometers have been reported and multiple times before and the analysis and validation that is done in this study does not go beyond what has been done before. I think the authors have also not done a good job in reviewing the state of the art, because references to very similar systems are missing (e.g. Shimura et al., 2018; Nolan et al., 2018; Reuter et al., 2020; Thielicke et al., 2020, list not complete...).
I believe that multicopters as wind measurement systems are a very valuable tool, but I do not at all agree that they can replace CFD in any way and think that suggesting this idea is very misleading for the broad audience. Airborne measurements can be a validation tool for CFD or lidars, but this is not included in this study. I think the authors are missing a good understanding of atmospheric boundary layer flow if they believe that some short measurement flights can give enough insight for a site assessment, especially in complex terrain. Again, this is reflected in a lack of suitable references and the missing discussion of atmospheric conditions during the measurement campaign.
I believe that the authors have a good instrument for wind measurement, but I strongly suggest that they reconsider what the original scientific contribution is that they can make with this study. I think the development of suitable measurement strategies / flight paths for the analysis of flow structures in complex terrain could be of interest, especially in combination with CFD, but this is not evaluated well enough to be published in WES at this point.

Nolan, P., Pinto, J., González-Rocha, J., Jensen, A., Vezzi, C., Bailey, S., de Boer, G., Diehl, C., Laurence, R., Powers, C., and et al.:Coordinated Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) and Ground-Based Weather Measurements to Predict Lagrangian Coherent Structures(LCSs), Sensors, 18, 4448, https://doi.org/10.3390/s18124448, http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s18124448, 201
Reuter, M., Bovensmann, H., Buchwitz, M., Borchardt, J., Krautwurst, S., Gerilowski, K., Lindauer, M., Kubistin, D., and Burrows, J. P.: Development of a small unmanned aircraft system to derive CO2emissions of anthropogenic point sources, Atmospheric MeasurementTechniques Discussions, 2020, 1–27, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-234, 2
Shimura, T., Inoue, M., Tsujimoto, H., Sasaki, K., and Iguchi, M.: Estimation of Wind Vector Profile Using a Hexarotor Unmanned AerialVehicle and Its Application to Meteorological Observation up to 1000 m above Surface, Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology,35, 1621–1631, https://doi.org/10.1175/jtech-d-17-0186.1, 2018.
Thielicke, W., Hübert, W., and Müller, U.: Towards accurate and practical drone-based wind measurements with an ultrasonic anemome-ter, Atmospheric Measurement Techniques Discussions, 2020, 1–29, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-2020-258, 2020

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RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (05 Nov 2020)

RR by Anonymous Referee #4 (11 Nov 2020)

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (11 Nov 2020) by Rebecca Barthelmie

AR by Christian Ingenhorst on behalf of the Authors (18 Dec 2020) Author's response Author's tracked changes Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (18 Dec 2020) by Rebecca Barthelmie

ED: Publish as is (22 Dec 2020) by Gerard J.W. van Bussel(Chief editor)

Short summary

Wind farm sites in complex terrain are subject to local wind phenomena, which are difficult to quantify but have a huge impact on a wind turbine's annual energy production. Therefore, a wind sensor was applied on an unmanned aerial vehicle and validated against stationary wind sensors with good agreement. A measurement over complex terrain showed local deviations from the mean wind speed of approx. ± 30 %, indicating the importance of an extensive site evaluation to reduce investment risk.