the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Wind farm flow control: prospects and challenges
- 1KU Leuven, Mechanical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 300A, B3001 Leuven, Belgium
- 2Chair of Wind Energy, Technische Universität München, Boltzmannstr. 15, 85748 Garching b. München, Germany
- 3DTU Wind Energy, Frederiksborgvej 399, DK-4000 Roskilde
- 4National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Boulder, Colorado, US
- 5Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy, Tonsbakken 16, 2740 Skovlunde, Denmark
- 6Delft University of Technology, Delft Center for Systems and Control, Mekelweg 2, 2628 CD Delft, The Netherlands
- 1KU Leuven, Mechanical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 300A, B3001 Leuven, Belgium
- 2Chair of Wind Energy, Technische Universität München, Boltzmannstr. 15, 85748 Garching b. München, Germany
- 3DTU Wind Energy, Frederiksborgvej 399, DK-4000 Roskilde
- 4National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Boulder, Colorado, US
- 5Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy, Tonsbakken 16, 2740 Skovlunde, Denmark
- 6Delft University of Technology, Delft Center for Systems and Control, Mekelweg 2, 2628 CD Delft, The Netherlands
Abstract. Wind farm control has been a topic of research for more than two decades. It has been identified as a core component of grand challenges in wind energy science to support accelerated wind energy deployment and transition to a clean and sustainable energy system for the 21st century. The prospect of collective control of wind turbines in an array to increase energy extraction, reduce loads, improve the balance of systems, reduce operation and maintenance costs, etc. has inspired many researchers over the years to propose innovative ideas and solutions. However, practical demonstration and commercialization of some of the more advanced concepts has been limited by a wide range of challenges, which include the complex physics of turbulent flows in wind farms and the atmosphere, uncertainties related to predicting load and failure statistics, and the highly multi-disciplinary nature of the overall design optimization problem, among others. In the current work, we aim at providing a comprehensive overview of the state of the art and outstanding challenges, thus identifying the key research areas that could further enable commercial uptake and success of wind farm control solutions. To this end, we have structured the discussion on challenges and opportunities into four main areas: (1) insight in control flow physics, (2) algorithms and AI, (3) validation and industry implementation, and (4) integrating control with system design (co-design).
Johan Meyers et al.
Status: final response (author comments only)
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RC1: 'Comment on wes-2022-24', Anonymous Referee #1, 19 Apr 2022
A very thorough and comprehensive review of the current status of wind farm flow control. Some sections are perhaps a bit wordy, and there will always be scope to include a few more references. Just a very few small and specific comments:
Line 142-3: "While these types of precise implementation details can matter, e.g., for turbine loading" - these details can be more significant than this implies; the exact means by which a particular wake change is achieved can affect power output as well as loads.
Line 182: wake steering combined with overinductive induction control: this could further exacerbate loading; whereas the option to combine wake steering with 'normal' induction control (not necessarily simultaneously on a particular turbine but depending on turbine position and wind condition) should also me mentioned (and referenced) in this paragraph - it's one option for achieving a suitable compromise between energy production and loading.
Line 210: "resort under" - do you mean "result in", or something implying "be equivalent to"?
Line 444: typo "leveraged"
Line 950: "reliability of the facility"
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RC2: 'Comment on wes-2022-24', Irene Eguinoa, 26 Apr 2022
This paper presents a comprehensive overview of wind farm flow control, its current status, as well as challenges for its practical demonstration and commercialization, organized under four key research areas. Although it’s always difficult to find a balance between length and depth for such a wide technological field, authors provide an excellent coverage of the most relevant aspects discussed within the community and an extensive list of references.
Some comments are included below for further improvement of the manuscript:
Specific comments:
- Lines-87-88: The sentence “Still, some clear benefits…” could be supported with a reference to section 5.1, where those aspects are further discussed.
- The way of presenting section 2.1, dealing with static wake control aspects, seems to mismatch the approach for the rest of section 2, where aspects of the flow physics are analyzed instead. From section 2.1, it could be inferred that the challenges presented only affect the static controls rather than being related to the (quasi)-steady dynamics of the flow physics (as mentioned in Line-228). Could you please clarify?
- At the end of section 2.2.2, in Line-372, it is stated that the use of LES simulations as a control model is hindered by the large cost and complexity associated. Then, further in the text (Line-382), a related discussion is raised about the relevant factors (minimum resolution, model simplifications) when considering its potential application in real time. Could those factors also be applicable to the offline case initial discussion?
- Line-483: Could you please specify/clarify the exact meaning of “cautious decisions” in this context?
- Section 3.2.
- The overall challenges for the closed-loop paradigm are mentioned in Lines-488-489, but the rest of the section seems to be at some parts just a description of the state of the art rather than an identification and further development of the corresponding challenges (e.g. state estimation paragraph). It would be advised to clearly identify the specific challenges addressed.
- Novel optimization routines are identified as a challenge for the closed-loop paradigm (Lines-488-489), but this isn’t truly developed in the corresponding paragraph devoted to “robust decision making”. Some aspects that are important are listed below, but it is unclear whether authors considered all those aspects as challenges (unresolved issues) or just relevant factors in the selection of the optimization algorithm.
- Section 3.3: For the sake of clarity, could you please explain in more detail in what data-driven workflows (Line-563) consists of as opposed to physics-based workflows (Line-563) and AI-driven workflows (Line-579)? Maybe a diagram or short description would be of help to make the distinction.
- Section 4.4. Does the section only apply to WFFC technology developments performed by OEMs or is it extensive to any other technology provider? If the latter is the case, shouldn’t it be considered as a relevant challenge the (standardized) access to information between farm and turbine level and the communication interface of WFFC with turbine control?
Technical corrections:
- Lines-56-57. Reference to Figure 1 seems to be a bit out of place. The content of the figure seems to be more in relation with the discussion in Section 1.2 rather than that at the beginning of Section 1, where the figure is introduced in the text (Lines-56-57).
- Taking into account the different meanings of the term “loading” depending on the discipline, it would be advised to clarify that unless specified otherwise, it refers to structural loading. First use in Line-18.
- The acronym for wind farm flow control (WFFC) is defined in Line-36, but it scarcely appears afterwards throughout the paper despite being one of the most mentioned terms. Authors are encouraged to make use of it in order to lighten the text. Please also note that its first appearance is in Line-33.
- Line-380: Is it meant to say “real-time controller” instead of “real controller”?
- Caption Figure 5 – For the sake of clarity, please specify the type of control scheme depicted (open-loop), in accordance with the explanation in the text.
- Caption Figure 6 – For the sake of clarity, please specify the type of control scheme depicted (closed-loop), in accordance with the explanation in the text.
- Acronyms – LES -> first instance in the text is in Line-170 instead of Line-180.
- Line-506: typo “uses techniques”
- References:
- Please try to make all references discoverable with either DOI link (if applicable) or direct access link.
- Reference in Line-1260: is the author properly presented?
- Some references are missing the publication year: Line-1380, Line-1384.
Johan Meyers et al.
Johan Meyers et al.
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