Richard J.A.M. Stevens

Physics of Fluids · University of Twente

Publication 37 · Wind-farm flow

Coupled wake boundary layer model of wind farms

R.J.A.M. Stevens, D.F. Gayme, C. Meneveau, J. Renew. Sustain. Energy 7, 023115 (2015).

Main finding

For neutral regular arrays, CWBL improves aggregate power trends by coupling wake geometry to an atmospheric-boundary-layer momentum balance. Its inferred k_w and s_ye are effective closure parameters, and the two selected aligned field-sector comparisons demonstrate plausibility rather than general operational validation.

Schematic coupling a wake model to a top-down boundary layer model
How to read the figure. The coupled wake boundary layer model: a wake model describing the flow between turbines and a top-down model describing the internal boundary layer growing over the farm, joined through an effective spanwise spacing and an effective wake expansion coefficient. Farm performance is set at both scales at once, which is why neither model closes on its own. The two coupling parameters are effective closure constants inferred from data rather than measured quantities, and the field comparisons show plausibility rather than general operational validation. Open the full-resolution figure. Figure 1. R.J.A.M. Stevens et al. (2015). No separate licence is stated here; consult the original publication and credited source before reuse.

Why this matters

Why wind-farm performance is multiscale and requires both turbine wakes and atmospheric momentum supply.

Research context

The framework couples turbine-wake overlap to the boundary-layer momentum supply through effective width and wake-growth closures. A generalized formulation extends the layout treatment, while later multiscale work examines downstream recovery mechanisms absent from the 2015 model.

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