Evaluating wind farm wakes in large eddy simulations and engineering models

Stieren, A.; Stevens, R.J.A.M.

doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1934/1/012018

Evaluating wind farm wakes in large eddy simulations and engineering models

A. Stieren, R.J.A.M. Stevens, J. Phys. Conf. Ser. 1934, 012018 (2021).

Main finding

The paper is strong evidence that common hub-height engineering implementations can over-recover a farm wake even when they reproduce within-farm power reasonably, and that second-farm entrance power is a discriminating metric. It is not a general ranking or a validation of complete TurbOPark.

Disk-averaged velocity along two wind farms for simulation and four engineering models — **How to read the figure.** Disk-averaged wind speed along two wind farms in line, from large-eddy simulation and from four engineering wake models. The models recover faster than the simulation through the gap between the farms and so arrive at the second farm's first row too fast; the simulation still shows about a 3% speed loss ten kilometres downstream. Entrance power at a second farm is therefore a discriminating test that within-farm power alone does not provide. Open the full-resolution figure. Figure 2. A. Stieren and R.J.A.M. Stevens (2021). No separate licence is stated here; consult the original publication and credited source before reuse.

Why this matters

A wake from one farm can lower the first-row output of another 10 km away.

Research context

The comparison places engineering wake models against concurrent-precursor LES for finite farms, exposing where simple wake superposition misses vertical momentum supply and entrance effects. Later finite-farm interaction, power-density, and energy-budget studies broaden the scale range and diagnose mechanisms not represented by those reduced models.

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