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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">WESD</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>Wind Energy Science Discussions</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">WESD</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">Wind Energ. Sci. Discuss.</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub">2366-7621</issn>
<publisher><publisher-name></publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/wes-2026-121</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Operational Weather Windows for Offshore Wind in the Taiwan Strait: Long-Term Variability, Regional Wind Modes, and Climate Linkages</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wang</surname>
<given-names>Yi-Hui</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0430-0129</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wang</surname>
<given-names>Yi-Chi</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2781-8673</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Tseng</surname>
<given-names>Wan-Ling</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6644-9965</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wu</surname>
<given-names>Yueh-Shyuan</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Department of Statistics, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, California, USA</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, Norrkoping, Sweden</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>Institute of Sustainable Development and Climate Policy, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff4">
<label>4</label>
<addr-line>Green Energy and Environment Research Laboratories, Industrial Technology Research Institute, Hsinchu, Taipei, Taiwan</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>04</day>
<month>09</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>20</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Yi-Hui Wang et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://wes.copernicus.org/preprints/wes-2026-121/">This article is available from https://wes.copernicus.org/preprints/wes-2026-121/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://wes.copernicus.org/preprints/wes-2026-121/wes-2026-121.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://wes.copernicus.org/preprints/wes-2026-121/wes-2026-121.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>Previous studies have either focused on shorter operational records or on ENSO-related variability over more limited periods, leaving the role of regional wind modes and longer-term climate context less explored. Here, we use more than 60 years of ERA5 reanalysis data to examine weather-window variability relevant to Taiwan&apos;s offshore wind development and to identify the proximal regional wind modes and large-scale climate linkages associated with this variability. Compared with winter, summer provides the greatest number of operational weather windows and exhibits relatively stable year-to-year variability, making it the primary season for offshore operational activities near Taiwan. Interannual variability in June&amp;ndash;July&amp;ndash;August mean weather-window counts is dominated by two regional wind modes across the Taiwan Strait, with secondary contributions from episodic tropical cyclone activity and broader climate linkages involving the Western North Pacific summer monsoon and ENSO-related sea surface temperature signal. Together, the regional wind modes, tropical cyclone activity, and climate-linkage indicators account for more than 60 % of the variance in summer weather-window availability. Notably, during the period corresponding to the onset of Taiwan&apos;s offshore wind development (2018&amp;ndash;2024), summers exhibited near-maximum accessibility relative to other 7-year windows in the 65-year record, indicating that such favorable conditions should not be assumed to persist. These results demonstrate the value of long-term weather-window analysis for addressing how offshore wind operating conditions are associated with broader climate variability and for supporting risk-informed construction and operations planning.</p>
</abstract>
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<funding-group>
<award-group id="gs1">
<funding-source>National Science and Technology Council</funding-source>
<award-id>NSTC 113-2111-M-002-016, 114-2628-M-002-015-MY4, 112-2923-M-001-003-MY4</award-id>
</award-group>
</funding-group>
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</front>
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