12

Variability of Wind and Wind Power

Joaquin Mur-Amada and ngel Bayod-Rjula
Zaragoza University
Spain
1. Introduction
The installed capacity for wind power is increasing substantially in response to the
worldwide interest in low-emissions power sources and a desire to decrease the dependence
on petroleum.
The European Union directive 2009/28/EC enforces the mandatory target of a 20 % share of
energy from renewable sources in overall Community energy consumption by 2020 and a
mandatory 10 % minimum target to be achieved by all Member States for the share of
biofuels in transport petrol and diesel consumption by 2020. These targets may require
between 30 and 40 % of the electricity in the European Union to come from renewable
energy sources by 2020.
In the U.S., the world's top wind producer (The Guardian, 2008), wind currently makes up
just one percent of the energy supply. Wind power generation share is expected to grow up
to 20% in the USA by 2030 (EnerNex, 2006; U.S. D.O.E., 2008). Moreover, many U.S. states
have legislated similarly ambitious renewable energy portfolio standards.
These goals were set without regard for the fact that many in the scientific community have
concluded a theoretical wind penetration limit of only 20% due to the degradation of system
reliability (DeCarolis et al., 2005). The Department of Energy states that there is no
fundamental technical reason why 20 percent of wind energy cannot be assimilated into the
grid by 2030. To help make its point, the agency debunks the reliability myth in its fact sheet
on Wind Energy Myths (U.S. D.O.E. 2005).
According to (Feldman, 2009), the renewable output could leap to 40 percent of the Irish
electricity share; in Denmark to 33 percent; in Portugal to 28 percent; and in Germany and
Greece to 25 percent. After 2020, a higher proportion may be needed. A significant amount
of this renewable electricity is likely to come from wind, and the variability of this power
needs to be managed.
With this amount of wind generation, the future electricity markets could be very different
to those of today: instead of thermal power stations dominating the system, the market
could be dominated by large amounts of price-insensitive nuclear and wind power,
combined with highly intermittent output from the wind farms (Pyry PLC, 2009).
The extent of uncertainty and variability in wind generation makes this resource different
from the traditional, dispatchable generation resources, with the result that wind power
generation cannot be readily integrated into standard system operating procedures (IEA,
2009). At relatively low levels of installed capacity, wind turbines and the output from large
wind farms can essentially be absorbed into traditional system operations without
Source: Wind Power, Book edited by: S. M. Muyeen,
ISBN 978-953-7619-81-7, pp. 558, June 2010, INTECH, Croatia, downloaded from SCIYO.COM
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degrading system reliability. At the current higher projected levels of penetration, wind
power requires more sophisticated mechanisms to maximize its participation in the power
system without penalizing it for the unavoidably intermittent nature of its resource
(Sovacool, 2009).
In some real time markets, and at low levels of penetration, wind is treated as negative load
(J. Apt, 2007). But the perception of wind power is changing from being considered a
negative load to a capacity resource. Wind power can be integrated into system and market
operations as a generating resource that could provide not only energy but also capacity and
ancillary services (Piwko et al., 2004).
1.1 Relationship between wind power variability and its forecast
Wind varies in space and in time. The forecasts try to predict this variation from climate
dynamics and from the systematic behavior of the weather.
The inherent uncertainty and availability of the meteorological data decreases the accuracy
of the next days wind generation forecast (Anderson et al., 2008). The issue of uncertainty in
wind generation can be addressed by improving the accuracy of forecasting the wind
resource. In addition, advances in wind forecasting and turbine controls suggest that wind
power can participate in ancillary service markets.
The simplest forecast of a stochastic process is the persistence principle: the expected value
during next period [t, t+t] is the average value of the previous period [t- t, t]. The mean
square error of the persistence prediction is just the variance of the average process during
the interval [t - t, t].
Thus, the ratio of the forecast root squared error to the standard deviation of the variable
predicted is just the performance of the forecast relative to the persistence model.
Usually, numerical weather prediction significantly outperforms persistence for horizons
longer than 6 hours. For shorter horizons, statistical methods can be more adequate due to
the lack of a dense network of weather sensors near the wind farms. In such cases, the
characterization of wind power variability is essential.
1.2 Influence of the wind variability on the grid
Wind power presents the most economically viable renewable solution, apart from hydro
power (DeCarolis et al., 2005). The utility system is designed to accommodate load
fluctuations, which occur continuously. This feature also facilitates accommodation of wind
plant output fluctuations when wind penetration is low.
In order to make the long-term growth of wind generation possible, the variability and the
intermittency of wind power must be managed (Boyle, 2007). In Denmark, Northern
Germany, and parts of Spain, wind supplies 20% to 40% of electric loads without sacrificing
reliability.
Generally, wind power forecast are targeted to optimize the hourly power dispatch.
However, the electric system has to cope with instantaneous variation of load, generation
and equipment trips. Such variations are usually unpredictable and they are usually
considered deviations from the expected power tendency.
The variability of wind power has several negative effects on the reliability and system
operation of the electric grid as well as wind project economics (Constantinescu et al., 2009).
The stability of the electric grid depends upon reliable and consistent power generation that
is balanced to the load through unit commitment (interhour), economic dispatch (intrahour),
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and regulation (intraminute), and wind power is counterproductive towards that effort. Due
to its stochastic nature, wind generation is not dispatchable and therefore cannot be called
upon to serve load. As a result, the capacity credit of a wind farm is very smalleven as low
as 8% of nameplate capacity according to a probabilistic loss-of-load analysis (Milligan,
2000).
Greater reliance on wind power requires more ancillary services, especially responsive
reserves, to match the lost generation and ramp rate of wind turbines when the wind dies
down. One study of a typical wind farm indicated ramp rates up to 4.4% of capacity per
second (Parson et al., 2001), implying a large burden on ancillary services. In fact, an
empirical analysis of increasing wind penetration in the Pacific Northwest U.S.
demonstrated that reserve requirements increased with the square of installed wind
capacity, and the need for total reserve capacity doubled after just 2500 MW of installed
wind capacity (Parsons et al., 2004).
In some applications, the estimation of wind power variability can be as important as its
prediction. The forecasted values are usually the hourly wind or the hourly power
generated by one turbine or a cluster of them. Most forecast models predict only the average
hourly wind or wind power and they are intended for the requirements of the electricity
markets. Only a few models characterize the uncertainty of the forecast and quantify the
instantaneous fluctuations inside the time period.
The main applications which benefit from variability assessment are:
The control of wind turbines and wind farms, where the short timescales involved
makes forecasting unpractical.
Automatic generation control, automatic voltage control or changes in automatic taps
on transformers, more concerned with interhourly variations, that are quite difficult to
predict.
Improving the power quality, more related to voltage variations and hence,
instantaneous power variations.
Optimum sizing of storage devices or of running reserves in isolated or weak systems,
where electricity must be supplied even in the worst case scenario.
In risk assessment and the safe operation of the grid. The system must cope with
unexpected outcomes when the forecast has big uncertainty.
1.3 Geographic diversity on wind power
Both the generated power and the forecast error decrease as more wind power producers
are aggregated. Due to the geographic dispersion of wind generators, some power
variations and prediction errors can be partially cancelled by other errors in other locations.
On the one hand, the forecast errors can be very low in wide geographic areas. The power
balance can be met provided the electricity transmission networks are strong enough to
carry the undispatchable generated power from remote areas (Matevosyan, 2006; Holttinen
et al., 2007).
On the other hand, many quality parameters of the grid must be met locally and the
reinforcement of the electricity networks is costly and, sometimes, it is not feasible. In
islands, the power balance cannot rely on geographical diversity and other measures are
required to counteract the wind power variability.
The weather conditions may remain stable for relative long periods among shift weather
changes. Quick local turbulent fluctuations are tougher to predict in time and place than
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some smooth weather evolution. In fact, a good parameter of the accuracy of the prediction
is the error relative to the variance of the random variable to be predicted.
However, the wind power forecast accuracy is usually referred to the total installed wind
power considered in the prediction. These figures must be considered with caution:
A 15% prediction error of the hourly power one day ahead of a single wind farm can be
an accurate forecast (Mart et al., 2006, Ramirez-Rosado et al., 2009).
A 15% prediction error of the hourly power one day ahead in a big system is a poor
forecast (Juban et al., 2008).
The variance of the wind power decreases when increasing the time period of the measure
or the spatial diversity of the wind generators. Therefore, increasing the time or space
horizon of the predictions lowers the absolute prediction error. The standard deviation to
mean ratio, called coefficient of variation (CV) (Parsons et al., 2001; Wan et al. 2002), is also
sensitive to the geographic, the time averaging and the prediction horizon, as can be seen in
Table 1.
The table 1 compares output at the start and end of the indicated time period in terms of the
percentage of total generation from each turbine group. Std. Dev. is the abbreviation for
standard deviation. CV stands for coefficient of variation, the ratio of standard deviation
respect the mean of wind power.
The power spectral density identifies which frequencies of variation are contributing to the
variance (Apt, 2007). The coherence indicates the degree of partial cancellation of the
oscillation among the turbines at different frequencies (Srensen et al. 2008). These two
magnitudes can explain the effect of the geographic and time averaging. In the spatial
domain, high frequencies smooth out a wind farms aggregate power output since the
coherence of the turbines outputs is low, while low spatial frequencies cause a coherent
variation in the farms turbines.


14
Turbines
(%)
61
Turbines
(%)
138
Turbines
(%)
250+
Turbines
(%)
1-Second Interval
Average CV 0.4 0.2 0.1 0.1
Std. Dev. 0.5 0.3 0.2 0.1
1-Minute Interval
Average CV 1.2 0.8 0.5 0.3
Std. Dev. 2.1 1.3 0.8 0.6
10-Minute Interval
Average CV 3.1 2.1 2.2 1.5
Std. Dev. 5.2 3.5 3.7 2.7
1-Hour Interval
Average CV 7.0 4.7 6.4 5.3
Std. Dev. 10.7 7.5 9.7 7.9
Table 1. Wind generation variability as a function of the number of generators and time
interval (from 20% wind energy by 2030: Increasing Wind Energy (U.S. D.O.E, 2008)
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1.4 Demand response and wind variability
To a large extent, load exhibits similar characteristics uncertainty and variability to wind
power (Apt, 2007). Load patterns though, have been more extensively studied for many
years and so are better understood and more accurately forecasted than the wind resource.
The purpose of this effort in load modelling is to understand load patterns well enough to
operate the power system through the control of individual generation and transmission
facilities, in order to serve load and maintain system reliability.
Thus, load is extensively modelled and other facilities are controlled to serve load, with
relatively little effort made to control load itself. This trend is not absolute, as there are
traditional utility mechanisms, such as interruptible contracts and direct load control, to
reduce load at times when system reliability would otherwise be threatened. There is also
persistent interest in developing mechanisms for more dynamic load response for both
reliability and economic purposes.
Recent efforts to allow load to be more responsive to system conditions and a more active
participant in electricity markets arise for multiple reasons (Cappers et al., 2009). In addition
to giving customers incentives to decrease their demand in the short run to improve system
reliability during times of system peak, demand response can be used in the long term to
decrease required capacity expansion and lower total costs. Demand response is also an
important and essentially absent element in electricity markets. If it were to be more widely
implemented, market efficiency would be likely to improve. Many efforts are being made to
demonstrate the feasibility and the convenience of smart grids.
1.5 Estimated cost of wind power variability
The estimated cost of the uncontrollability of the wind resource has been widely researched
from governmental policy makers to Independent System Operators (Porter et al., 2007). An
understanding of the impacts of the variable sources of renewable energy must take into
account the wider issues associated with managing electricity systems (Lamont, 2008).
Modern integrated networks are designed to cope with shocks such as the sudden loss of
large thermal power stations and with uncertainties in consumer demand, such as those
caused by televised sports events. As the tools to deal with these are already available, the
key question is the extent to which the introduction of large amounts of wind energy will
increase the overall uncertainty in matching supply and demand. This extra uncertainty
means that additional short-term reserves are needed to guarantee the security of the system
(Matos, 2009).
The variability of wind power also adversely affects wind project economics. A stochastic
power source like wind is inherently less valuable than a deterministic source. Net
payments to wind generators are reduced by balancing-costs to compensate for unfulfilled
obligations to generate power (Holttinen, 2008).
(Hirst et al, 2004) determined that net payments in the USA to wind farms vary from
$32/MWh for very small wind farms to less than $10/MWh for farms larger than 2000 MW.
(Holttinen et al., 2007) states that at wind penetrations of up to 20% of gross demand (en-
ergy), system operating cost increases arising from wind variability and uncertainty
amounted to about 1~4 /MWh. This is 10% or less of the wholesale value of the wind en-
ergy.
The cost of grid reinforcements due to wind power is very dependent on where the wind
power plants are located relative to load and grid infrastructure. The grid reinforcement
costs from studies vary from 50 /kW to 160 /kW in (Holttinen et al., 2007). The costs are
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not continuous; there can be single very high cost reinforcements, and there can also be
differences in how the costs are allocated to wind power.
According to (Milborrow, 2009), the extra cost in the UK of these reserves with wind pro-
viding 20% of electricity consumption is unlikely to be more than 1.20/MWh on electricity
bills (a little over 1% on domestic bills). With 40% of electricity provided by wind, the
corresponding figure would be 2.80/MWh.
A second costs of wind variability is the backup cost for periods of very low wind resource
along extensive geographical areas. (Recharge, 2009) reported that the calculations made by
Oxford University Environmental Change Institute showed that between 1970-2003, low
wind speeds all across the whole UK those too slow to generate energy occurred si-
multaneously in the country only one hour per year on average. In other words, the total
wind power in the UK varies, but a 0% generation is quite unlikely event. According to
(Milborrow, 2009), wind energy does not require the introduction of special back-up provi-
sions in the UK and its back-up costs are modest. Though the study was focused in the UK,
the results are relevant worldwide, as characteristics of wind are broadly similar.
All generating plants make use of a common pool of backup plant that is typically around
20% of the peak demand on the electricity network. When wind is introduced, system op-
erators do not rely on the rated power of all the installed wind farms being available at the
times of peak demand, but a lower amount - roughly 30% of the rated capacity at low pene-
tration levels, falling to about 15% at high penetration levels. This lower capacity credit
gives rise to a modest backup cost. Constraint costs arise when the output from the wind
turbines exceeds the demand on the electricity network. They are unlikely to arise until
wind energy is contributing around 25% of electricity requirements.
Overall, it is concluded that the additional costs associated with variability with wind
power providing up to about 40% of all electricity, are quite small. For example, if wind
provides 22% of electricity in the UK by 2020, variability costs would increase the domestic
electricity price by about 2%, according to (Milborrow, 2009). Further increases in the level
of wind penetration beyond that point are feasible and do not rely on the introduction of
new technology.
There are numerous technical innovations at various stages of development that can miti-
gate the costs associated with variability. Improved methods of wind prediction are under
development worldwide and could potentially reduce the costs of additional reserve by
around 30%. Most other mitigation measures reduce the costs of managing the electricity
network as a whole. Smart grids, for example, cover a range of technologies that may re-
duce the costs of short-term reserves; additional interconnections with Europe, including
Supergrids also deliver system-wide benefits and aid the assimilation of variability.
Electric cars hold out the prospect of reduced emissions for the transport network as a
whole and could act as a form of storage for the electricity network for which the electricity
generator would not have to pay.
With current technology, wind power plants can be designed to meet industry expectations
such as riding through voltage dips, supplying reactive power to the system, controlling
terminal voltage, and participating in system operation with output and ramp rate control.
Although some aspects of the management of wind variability can be controversial and costly,
many utilities agree that there is no insuperable technical reason why high proportions of
wind energy cannot be assimilated into the system (UK National Grid, 2009). There is a large
body of literature on the topic (IEA, 2006) and the steady growth of wind power, worldwide,
indicates that it is seen as a robust choice for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
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2. Classification of wind and wind power oscillations
Oscillations due to wind speed variations can be classified according to their rate and their
spatial extent. Slow fluctuations (in the range of tens of minutes and hours) are mainly due
to meteorological dynamics and they are highly correlated among near wind farms.
Fast fluctuations have lower spatial correlation (Nichita et al., 2002; Petru & Thiringer, 2002)
and wind gust and turbulence effects are smoothed in the output of the wind farm. A swift
gust arriving simultaneously to all turbines dispersed in an area of kilometres is also very
uncommon. The correlated component of wind is estimated in (Rosas, 2003) from the
Davenport type and Schlez and Infields decay factors (Schlez & Infield, 1998), showing that
coherence for distances greater than 100 m is bellow 10
-20
at tower shadow frequencies
(between 0.5 Hz and 2 Hz). In fact, the coherence for the usual dimension of a wind farm is
low for oscillations quicker than 0,001 Hz (Srensen et al., 2007). Thus, the fluctuations
quicker than 10 minutes are low correlated among the turbines a wind farm.
Fast fluctuations of power output can be divided into cyclic components (tower shadow,
wind shear, modal vibrations, etc.), weather dynamics and events (connection or
disconnection of the turbine, change in generator configuration, etc.). Oscillations from a
few minutes to power supply frequency are mainly linearly uncorrelated and their sum
across a wind farm can be estimated using stochastic analysis commonly applied in other
areas such as multipath fading in communication channels, clutter and target cross section
in radars, interference in communication systems, etc. However, this approach is novel in
wind energy. In (Welfonder, 1997) a transfer function of the wind farm power output
respect the output of a single turbine is estimated with gain N at low frequencies
(f < 0.03 Hz) and gain N at high frequencies (f > 0.09 Hz). Micro-meteorological and
dynamic fluid models can predict the correlated fluctuations which predominate at the very
low frequencies. Fully correlated fluctuations scales proportional to the number of turbines
N whereas linearly uncorrelated fluctuations cancel partially among turbines and they scale
up typically in a factor N, according to the central limit theorem.
The influence of blade position in a single turbine power output has been widely analyzed
in the literature (Gordon-Leishman, 2002; Dolan & Lehn, 2005; Dolan & Lehn, 2006).
According to (Cidrs et al. 2002), a very steady and very uniform wind in conjunction with a
weak electrical network is necessary for synchronization to happen driven by voltage drops.
Moreover, simultaneous tower shadow at all turbines in a wind farm is a very uncommon
event. If the turbine oscillations are not synchronized, the rotor positions have random
phases and the crossing of a blade in front of the turbine tower is a random event with
constant probability rate. As wind characteristics are similar inside the farm, the magnitude
of the cyclic components would be similar in all turbines.
Experimental measures (Mur-Amada et al., 2003) have shown that the cuasi-periodic
aerodynamic torque oscillations are transformed into stochastic oscillations of electric power
due to the complex wind turbine dynamics. The power oscillations of frequency bellow
0,03 Hz are greatly reduced at the farm output and the main source of variability in the
wind power injected in the grid is the meteorological dynamics.
To sum up, this chapter focuses on the spatial and temporal variability of the wind for short
horizons. Fast fluctuations of wind power during continuous operation of wind turbine are
not an issue for utilities. Only in isolated or weak networks, or in the simultaneous tripping
event of big amounts of wind power they are an issue. These results can be extended to
several wind farms since the uncorrelated components increases when the distances among
turbines become bigger.
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3. Turbulence overview
3.1 Turbulence characterization
At a very basic level, a turbulence flow can be interpreted as a population of many eddies
(vortices), of different sizes and strengths, embedded in another and forever changing,
giving a random appearance to the flow (Fig. 1). Two variables then play a fundamental
role: d, the characteristic diameter of the eddies, and , their characteristic orbital velocity.
Since the turbulent flow consist in many eddies, of varying sizes and speeds, and d do not
assume each of a single value but vary within a certain range. In stationary, homogeneous
and isotropic turbulence, that is, a turbulent flow that statistically appears unchanging in
time, uniform in space and without preferential direction, all eddies of a given size (same d)
behave more or less in the same way and can be thought of sharing the same characteristic
velocity . In other words, we make the assumption that is a function of d (Fig. 2).


Fig. 1. Drawing of a turbulent flow by Leonardo da Vinci (14521519), who recognized that
turbulence involves a multitude of eddies at various scales.


Fig. 2. Eddy orbital velocity versus eddy length scale in homogeneous turbulence. The
largest eddies spin the fastest. Modified from (Cushman-Roisin, 2007; Watson, 2003).
3.2 Wind spectra
The fluctuations in the wind can be thought of as resulting from a composite of sinusoidally
varying winds imposed on the mean steady wind. These sinusoidal variations will have a
variety of frequencies and amplitudes. The term spectrum is used to describe functions of
frequency. Thus the function that characterizes turbulence as a function of frequency is
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Fig. 3. Schematic of eddies as a function of height at atmospheric boundary layer. Modified
from (Watson, 2003).
known as a spectral density function. Since the average value of any sinusoid is zero, the
amplitudes are characterized in terms of their mean square values. This type of analysis
originated in electric power applications, where the square of the voltage or current is
proportional to the power. The complete name for the function describing the relation
between frequency and amplitudes of sine waves making up the fluctuating wind speed is
therefore power spectral density or PSD for short.
There are three points of particular importance to note regarding PSDs.
The wind variance due to fluctuations within a frequency range may be found by
integrating the
Uwind
PSD f
+
( ) in that range.
The integral of
Uwind
PSD f
+
( ) over all frequencies is equal to the total wind variance.
If two-sided PSD(f ) are used instead of PSD+(f), the variance is twice the PSD(f) if
only positive frequencies are used in the integration domain.
Power spectral densities are often used in dynamic analyses. The variations of wind in the
stream direction of the flow are usually characterized through the PSD of the longitudinal
component of the instantaneous speed. A number of power spectral density functions are
used as models in wind energy engineering when representative turbulence power spectral
densities are unavailable for a given site. The mathematical forms for along-wind velocity
spectra which are currently used in major current, or recent, wind codes and standards
(Tamura et al., 2003) are due to von Karman, Kaimal and Davenport.
3.3 Coherence models
IEC 61400-1, 2005 specifies the coherence function (in absolute value) ( )
IEC
f for two
points r and c separated a distance d
rc
in the rotor plane according to:

2 2

( ) exp 0,12
rc rc
IEC
wind Uwind
d f d
f A
U

= +

(1)
Zx{|v |w | {x yxx t{xx
\wvxw xww|x
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IEC 61400-1 recommends A 12; (Frandsen et al., 2007) recommends A 5 and
(Saranyasoontorn et al., 2004) recommends A 9,7. Note that this expression is intended for
points in the area swept by the blades. Therefore, it is not intended for estimating the wind
coherence at different turbines.
(Schlez & Infield, 1998) derived an empirical model, based mainly on measurements with 18
m high masts with distances up to 102 m in the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK.
According to them, the coherence decreases exponentially at a site-specific rate respect wind
travel time. The decay constants for lateral and longitudinal directions are, A
long
and A
lat
,
respectively. A
long
is the decay factor when the flow is longitudinal (
rc
= 0). A
lat
is the decay
factor when the flow is lateral, i.e. when the wind direction is perpendicular to the line
between points r and c (
rc
= /2 rad).
Thus, a compound decay constant A
rc
can be estimated according to (2) for any arbitrary
disposition of points r and c (see Fig. 4).

2 2
cos( ) sin( )
rc long rc lat rc
A A A

= +


(2)


r
c
rc


Fig. 4. Definition of distance d
rc
and angle
rc
between the points r and c.
(Schlez and Infield, 1998) recommended for the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory A
long

(155)
Uwind
/
wind
U and A
lat
(17,55)(m/s)
-1

Uwind
, where
Uwind
is the standard
deviation of the wind speed in m/s.
(Saranyasoontorn et al., 2004) adjusted a coherence model from experimental data in LIST
Test site at Bushland, Texas.
(Srensen et al., 2008) fitted the lateral and longitudinal decay factors, A
long
= 4 and A
lat
=
wind
U /(2 m/s), respectively, from measurements at 80 m height with up to 1.2 km
distances in Hvsre, Denmark. With these parameters, Srensen et al. used a complex
rooth coherence ( )
rc
f

(adding an average phase delay to the absolute squared coherence

2
( )
rc
f

proposed by Schlez and Infield, 1998). Since complex coherence is used, the phase
of the coherence indicates the average delay between wind fluctuations at different points.
Srensen et al., 2002, used the Taylors frozen turbulence model to compute the average
time delay
rc
as the time difference between the arrival to the points r and c of a flat wind
wave front travelling at average wind speed.
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cos( )
rc rc
rc
wind
d
U

= (3)
where
rc
d is the distance between points r and c (see Fig. 4).
Finally, the expression of the complex root coherence ( )
rc
f

for Hvsre is:

( ) exp 2
rc
rc rc rc
wind
d
f f A j
U



= +

(4)
It can be derived that at low frequencies ( )
rc
f

tends to unity with zero phase (fully

positive correlated fluctuations) and at high frequencies ( )
rc
f

tends to zero with random

phase (uncorrelated fluctuations).
4. Wind turbine torque
Power oscillations are the ultimate response of generators to torque fluctuations due to
spatial and temporal wind variations.
The turbine torque can be estimated from blade theory. Since either the blade section,
neither the relative speed nor the angle of attack is constant along the blade from the root to
the tip, torque must be integrated along the blade elements. The lift and drag coefficients for
the whole blade can be parameterized for blade tip conditions.
A further simplification is to consider a torque coefficient
q
C ( , ) depending only on the
pitch angle and on tip speed ratio . In this work, the tip speed ratio is referred to an
equivalent wind speed since the wind conditions vary along the swept area:
= R
rotor
/U
eq
, (5)
where R is the rotor radius,
rotor
is the rotor angular speed and U
eq
is the equivalent wind
speed. In a first approximation, U
eq
is the longitudinal wind speed component averaged
along the swept area provided the shaft is aligned with the wind (Handsen et al., 2003
Handsen et al., 2007).
Thus, the turbine torque is:

3 2 1
2
( , )
rotor air eq q
T R U C = (6)
where
air
is the air density.
In a second approximation, U
eq
is defined as the wind speed applied to (5) and (6) which
produces the same aerodynamic torque
rotor
T than the real wind field. Alternatively, the
torque coefficient can be computed as the power coefficient divided by the tip speed ratio,
( , )
q
C = ( , )/
P
C .
4.1 Definition of the equivalent wind, equivalent turbulence and effective quadratic
turbulence
a)Equivalent wind
The equivalent wind U
eq
is an artifice defined as the uniform wind which would produce the
same torque as the real wind field. According to (6), it can be computed from real torque as (7):
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Fig. 5. Effect of an uneven wind-speed distribution over the swept rotor area on the upwind
velocity of the rotating rotor blades. The lagrangian motion coordinates are added assuming
the turbine is aligned with the wind. Taken from (Handsen et al., 2003).

3
2
( , )
rotor
eq
air q
T
U
R C
= (7)
where ( , )
q
C is the turbine torque coefficient,
rotor
T is the torque in the low speed shaft of
the wind turbine, R is the rotor radius,
rotor
is the rotor angular speed and
air
is the air
density. Since the wind varies along the swept area (wind distribution is irregular), the tip
speed ratio must be computed also from (5).
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The simplification of using an equivalent wind is huge since the non-stationary three-
dimensional wind field is approximated by a signal which produces the same torque. Apart
form accelerating notably the simulations, U
eq
describes in only one signal the effect of the
turbulent flow in the drive train.
The actual wind speed
wind
U is measured at a point by an anemometer whereas the
equivalent wind speed
eq
U is referred to the rotor surface (or more precisely, to the turbine
torque). Since the Taylors hypothesis of frozen turbulence is usually applicable, the
spatial diversity of wind can be approximated to the pointwise time variation of wind times
its mean value,
wind
U , and hence
eq
U can be considered a low-pass filtered version of
wind
U (plus the rotational sampling effect due to wind shear and tower shadow effect).
On the one hand, the meteorological science refers to the actual wind speed
wind
U since the
equivalent wind
eq
U is, in fact, a mathematical artifice. On the other hand, turbine torque or
power is customarily referred to the equivalent wind
eq
U instead of the 3-D wind field for
convenience.
A good introduction about the equivalent wind can be found in (Martins et al. 2006). The
complete characteristics of the wind that the turbine will face during operation can be found
in (Burton et al., 2001).
The equivalent wind speed signal, U
eq
(t), just describes a smoothed wind speed time series
at the swept area. For calculating the influence of wind turbulence into the turbine
mechanical torque, it has to be considered the wind distribution along the swept area by a
vector field (Veers, 1988). Blade iteration techniques can be applied for a detailed analysis of
torques and forces in the rotor (Hier, 2006).
The anemometer dynamic response to fast changes in wind also influences measured wind
(Pedersen et al., 2006). Most measures are taken with cup anemometers, which have a
response lengths between 1 and 2 m, corresponding to a frequency cut-off between f
c
= (10
m/s)/10 m = 1 Hz and f
c
= (10 m/s)/20 m = 0,5 Hz for 10 m/s average speed.
Apart from metrological issues, the spatial diversity of turbulent wind field reduces its
impact in rotor torque. Complete and proved three dimensional wind models are available
for estimating aerodynamic behavior of turbines (Saranyasoontorn et al., 2004; Mann, 1998;
Antoniou et al., 2007). Turbulent models are typically used in blade fatigue load.
From the grid point of view, the main effect of spatial diversity is the torque modulation due
to wind shear and tower shadow (Gordon-Leishman, 2002). Vertical wind profile also
influences energy yield and it is considered in wind power resource assessment (Antoniou
et al., 2007).
5. Fundaments of the rotor spatial filtering
The idea in the rotor wind model is to generate an equivalent wind speed which can be
applied to a simplified aerodynamic model to simulate the torque on the wind turbine shaft.
The rotor wind filter includes the smoothing of the wind speed due to the weighted
averaging over the rotor.
The input of this filter is the wind U
wind
which would be measured at an anemometer
installed at the hub height and the output is the estimated equivalent wind, U
eq1
, which is a
smoothed version of the measured wind.
Neglecting the periodic components, the rotor block smoothing of wind turbine can be
expressed as a wind turbine admittance function defined as:
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1
2
1
( )
( )
( )
Uwind
Ueq
PSD f
H f
PSD f
= (8)
where ( )
Uwind
PSD f is the power spectral density of the wind measured at a point and
1
( )
Ueq
PSD f is the power spectral density of the equivalent wind (without the periodic
components due to the cuasi-deterministic variation of torque with rotor angle).
The wind spectrum ( )
Uwind
PSD f is equivalent to low-pass filters with a typical system
order r = 5/6 (i.e., the spectrum decays a bit slower than the output of a first-order low pass
filter). Power output decreases quicker than the pointwise wind at f > 0.01 Hz (Mur-Amada
et al. 2003) and this is partially due to the spatial distribution of turbulence, the high inertia
and the viscous-elastic coupling of turbine and generator through the gear box (Engelen,
2007). Complex vibration dynamics influence power output and a simple model with two
coupled mass (equivalent to a second-order system) is insufficient to represent the
resonance modes of blades and tower.
The square modulus of the filter can be computed from the filter Laplace transform
'
1
( ) H s :

2
1
( ) H f =
' ' *
1 1
( 2 )[ ( 2 )] H j f H j f (9)
The phase of the filter indicates the lag between the wind at the anemometer and at the
turbine hub. The phase of the filter does not affect
1
( )
Ueq
PSD f since wind process is
stationary and, accordingly, the phase is arbitrary. The lag difference of equivalent wind
among turbines at points r and c will be considered through complex coherence ( )
rc
f

,
irrespective of the argument of
1
( ) H f .
The frequencies of interest for flicker and blade fatigue are in the range of tenths of hertz to
35 Hz. These frequencies correspond to sub-sound and sound (inertial subrange) and they
have wavelengths comparable to the rotor diameter. The assumption that such fluctuations
correspond to plane waves travelling in the longitudinal direction and arriving
simultaneously at the rotor plane is not realistic. Therefore, quick fluctuations do not reach
the rotor disk simultaneously and fluctuations are partially attenuated by spatial diversity.
In brief,
'
1
( ) H s is a low-pass filter with meaningless phase.
The smoothing due to the spatial diversity in the rotor area is usually accounted as an
aerodynamic filter, basically as a first or second order low-pass filter of cut-off frequency
~0,1224U
wind
/R respect an ideal and unperturbed anemometer measure (Rosas, 2003). For
multimegawatt turbines, the rotor filters significantly fluctuations shorter than one minute
with a second order decay (cut-off frequency in the order of 0,017 Hz). The turbine
vibrations are much more noteworthy than the turbulence at frequencies higher than
0,1 Hz.
The presence of the ground surface hinders vertical development in larger eddies. The
lateral turbulence component is responsible for turbulence driven wind direction changes,
but it is a secondary factor in turbine torque fluctuations. Moreover, according IEC 61400-1,
2005, vertical and transversal turbulence has a significantly smaller length scale and lower
magnitude. Thus, the vertical and lateral component of turbulence averaged along the
turbine rotor can be neglected in turbine torque in the first instance.
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6. Equivalent wind of turbine clusters
6.1 Average farm behavior
Sometimes, a reduced model of the whole wind farm is very useful for simulating a wind
farm in the grid. The behavior of a network with wind generation can be studied supplying
the farm equivalent wind as input to a conventional turbine model connected to the
equivalent grid.
The foundations of these models, their usual conventions and their limitations can be seen in
(Akhmatov & Knudsen, 2002; Kazachkov & Stapleton, 2004; Fernandez et al, 2006). The
average power and torque in the turbines and in the farm are the same on per unit values.
This can be a significant advantage for the simulation since most parameters do not have to
be scalled. Notice that if electrical values are not expressed per unit, currents and network
parameters have to be properly scalled.
For convenience, all the N turbines of a wind farm are represented with a single turbine of
radius R
farm
spinning at angular speed
farm
. The equivalent power, torque, wind, rotor
speed, pitch and voltage are their average among the turbines of the farm. Thus, the
equivalent turbine represents the average operation among the farm turbines.
If the turbines are different or their operational conditions are dissimilar, the averages are
weighted by the turbine power (because the aim of this work is to reproduce the power
output of farms). Elsewhere, the farm averaged parameters can by approximated by a
conventional arithmetic mean.
6.2 Model based in equivalent squared wind
Assuming that the equivalent wind at the different wind turbines behaves as a multivariate
Gausian process with spectral covariance matrix:

Ueq i Ueq j Ueq ij

PSD f PSD f f f

=


, ,
( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) (10)
Thus, the
Ueq farm
PSD f
,
( ) of the equivalent squared wind for the farm can be computed as:

Ueq i Ueq j
N N
T
Ueq farm farm Ueq farm i j ij
i j
PSD f PSD f PSD f b f b b b f
= =
= =
, , ,
1 1
( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) (11)

where

ij
f ( ) is the complex coherence of the equivalent wind of turbines i and j at
frequency f, and the contribution of the turbine i to the farm wind is
i
b .
If all the turbines experience similar equivalent wind spectra
Ueq i Ueq
PSD f PSD f
,
( ) ( ) and
their contribution to the farm is similar 1/
i
b N then the following approximate formula
is valid:

N N
Ueq
Ueq farm ij
i j
PSD f
PSD f f
N
= =

,
1 1 2
( )
( ) ( ) (12)

Notice that

ii
f = ( ) 1 and

ij
f 0 ( ) 1 . Since the real part of

ij
f ( ) is usually positive
or close to zero (i.e., non-negative correlation of fluctuations),
Ueq farm
PSD f
,
( ) is generally
between the behavior of perfectly correlated and independent fluctuations at the turbines.
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Ueq Ueq
Ueq farm
PSD f PSD f
PSD f
N
N

,
2
( ) ( )
( ) (13)
since
'
0 Re[ ( )]
ij
f

6.3 Equivalent wind of turbines distributed along a geographical area
In (4), a model of complex root coherence ( )
rc
f

was introduced based on the works of

(Schlez & Infield, 1998) in the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and (Srensen et al., 2008) in
the Hvsre offshore wind farm. In (12), a formula was derived assuming all the turbines
experience a similar wind and they have similar characteristics.
In this section, the decrease of variability of the equivalent wind of a geographical area due
to its spatial diversity is computed in (14) from the variability at a single turbine or a single
farm and from the complex root coherence ( )
rc
f

.
Formula (14) assumes that wind turbines are approximately evenly spread over the area
corresponding to the integrating limits. Even though the former assumptions are
oversimplifications of the complex meteorological behavior neither it considers wakes, (14)
indicates the general trend in the decrease of wind power variability due to spatial diversity
in bigger areas. Notice that PSD
Ueq,turbine
(f) is assumed to be representative of the average
turbulence experienced by turbines in the region and hence, it must account average wake
effects. Even though the model is not accurate enough for many calculations, it leads to
expression (19) that links the smoothing effect of the spatial diversity of wind generators in
an area and its dimensions.



Fig. 6. Wind farm dimensions, angles and distances among wind farm points for the general
case.
The coherence ( )
rc
f

between points r =(x

1
,y
1
) and c = (x
2
,y
2
) inside the wind farm can
be derived from Fig. 6 and formulas (2), (3) and (4). The geometric distance between them is
d
rc
=|(x
2
,y
2
)(x
1
,y
1
)|= [(y
2
-y
1
)
2
+ (x
2
-x
1
)
2
]
1/2
and the angle between the line that links the two
points and the wind direction is
rc
= ArcTan[(y
2
-y
1
)/(x
2
-x
1
)]. In the general case, the
equivalent wind taking into account the spatial diversity can be computed extending
formula (12) to the continuous case:

a
b

(x
2
,y
2
)
(x
1
,y
1
) x
y

rc

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1 1
1 1
/2 /2 /2 /2
2 1 2 1
- /2 - /2 ,
/2 /2 /2 /2
,
2 1 2 1
- /2 - /2
( , , )
( )
( )
b b a a
rc rc rc
b y a x Ueq area
b b a a
Ueq turb
b y a x
f d dx dx dy dy
PSD f
PSD f
dx dx dy dy

(14)
where the quadruple integral in the denominator is a forth of the squared area, i.e., a
2
b
2
/4.


Fig. 7. Wind farm parameters when wind has the x direction (=0).
Due to the complexity of d
rc
and
rc
and the estimation of ( , , )
rc rc rc
f d

in formula (4), no
analytical closed form of (14) have been found for the general case.
In case wind has x direction as in Fig. 7, then the coherence has a simpler expression:
( , , )
rc rc rc
f d =

2 2
2 1 2 1 2 1
( ) ( ) 2 ( ) exp
long lat
wind
f
A x x A y y j x x
U

+ +



=

(15)
The presence of the squared root in (15) prevents from obtaining an analytical
,
( )
Ueq area
PSD f .
In case aA
long
bA
lat
, the region can be considered a thin column of turbines transversally
aligned to the wind. This is the case of many wind farms where turbine layout has been
designed to minimize wake loss (see Fig. 9) and areas where wind farms or turbines are
sited in mountain ridges, in seashores and in cliff tops perpendicular to the wind. Since
A
long
(x
2
-x
1
) A
lat
(y
2
-y
1
), then
,
( )
Ueq area
PSD f can be computed analytically as:

Ueq lat area
lat
Ueq turb wind
PSD f
A b f
f
PSD f U

,
1
,
( )
( )
(16)
where
( )
f e x x

+ = +
x 2
1
( ) 2 1 x /
In case aA
long
bA
lat
, the region can be considered a thin row of wind farms longitudinally
aligned to the wind. This is the case of many areas where wind farms are disposed in a
gorge, canyon, valley or similar where wind is directed in the feature direction (see Fig. 9).
Since A
long
(x
2
-x
1
) A
lat
(y
2
-y
1
), then
,
( )
Ueq area
PSD f can be computed analytically as:
=0
(x
1
,y
1
)

rc

wind
direction
a
b

x
y
(x
2
,y
2
)
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=0
a
b

(x
2
,y
2
)
(x
1
,y
1
)
wind direction



Fig. 8. Wind farm with turbines aligned transversally to the wind.

Ueq long area long
long
Ueq turb wind
PSD f A a f
f A
PSD f U

,
2
,
( )
,
( )
(17)
where

long long
long
wind wind
A a f A j a f
f A f
U U




=






2 1
( + 2 )
, Re
which can be expressed with real functions as:

long
f A =
2
( , )
( )
( )

long long long long long

long
A A A
e
A A
A

+ + +
+

2 2
2
2
2
2 2 2 4 2
( 1) ( 1) 1 Cos Sin
1
1 2 /
2
(18)

=0
a
b

(x
2
,y
2
)
(x
1
,y
1
)
wind direction


Fig. 9. Wind farm with turbines aligned longitudinally to the wind.
Notice that (17) includes an imaginary part that is due to the frozen turbulence model in
formula (4). A wind wave travels at wind speed, producing an spatially average PSD that
depends on the longitudinal length a relative to the wavelength. For long wavelengths
compared to the longitudinal dimension of the area (A
long
2), the imaginary part in (17) can
be neglected and (17) simplifies to (16). This is the case of the Rutherford Appleton
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307
Laboratory, where (Schlez & Infield, 1998) fitted the longitudinal decay factor to A
long

(155)
wind
U /
Uwind
for distances up to 102 m.
But when the wavelengths are similar or smaller than the longitudinal dimension,
(A
long
2), then the fluctuations are notably smoothed. This is the case of the Hvsre
offshore wind farm, where (Srensen et Al., 2008) fitted the longitudinal decay factor to A
long

= 4 for distances up to 2 km. In plain words, the disturbances travels at wind speed in the
longitudinal direction, not arriving at all the points of the area simultaneously and thus,
producing an average wind smoother in longitudinal areas than in transversal regions.
In the normalized longitudinal and transversal distances have the same order, then (14) can be
estimated as the compound of many stacked longitudinal or transversal areas (see Fig. 10):

Ueq rect area Ueq long area Ueq lat area
Ueq turb Ueq lat area Ueq turb
long
lat
long
wind wind
PSD f PSD f PSD f
H f
PSD f PSD f PSD f
A a f
A b f
f f A
U U
= =










2 , , ,
3
, , ,
1 2
( ) ( ) ( )
( )
( ) ( ) ( )

,
(19)


=0
b

wind
direction
a



Fig. 10. Rectangular area divided in smaller transversal areas.
The approximation (19) is equivalent to consider the Manhattan distance (L
1
or city-block
metric) instead of the Euclidean distance (L
2
metric) in the coherence
rc

(15):

long lat long lat
A x x A y y A x x A y y + +



2 2
2 1 2 1 2 1 2 1
( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) (20)
6.4 Equivalent wind smoothing due to turbine spatial layout
Expression (19) is the squared modulus of the transfer function of the spatial diversity
smoothing in the area. H f
3
( ) corresponds to the low-pass filters in Fig. 11 with cut-off
frequencies inversely proportional to the region dimensions.
The overall cut-off frequency of the spatially averaged wind is obtained solving
2
3
( ) H f =1/4. Thus, the cut-off frequency of transversal wind farms (solid black line in Fig.
11) is:
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cut la
a
w
t
l
ind
t
f
U
bA

=
,
6.83 (21)

In the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL), A
lat
(17,55)(m/s)
-1

Uwind
and hence f
cut,lat

(0,420,12)
wind
U / (
Uwind
b). A typical value of the turbulence intensity
Uwind
/
wind
U
is around 0,12 and for such value f
cut,lat
~ (3.51)/ b, where b is the lateral dimension of the
area in meters. For a lateral dimension of a wind farm of b = 3 km, the cut-off frequency is in
the order of 1,16 mHz.
In the Hvsre wind farm, A
lat
=
wind
U /(2 m/s) and hence f
cut,lat
13,66/b, where b is a
constant expressed in meters. For a wind farm of b = 3 km, the cut-off frequency is in the
order of 4,5 mHz (about four times the estimation from RAL).
In RAL, A
long
(155)
Uwind
/
wind
U . A typical value of the turbulence intensity
Uwind

/
wind
U is around 0,12 and for such value A
long
(1,80,6).

long long
wind win
cut lon
l
d
g
A A
ong
U U
f
a A a =

=

=
,
1,8 1.8
0.6 1, 577 1839 (22)

For a wind speed of
wind
U ~ 10 m/s and a wind farm of a = 3 km longitudinal dimension,
the cut-off frequency is in the order of 2,19 mHz.
In the Hvsre wind farm, A
long
= 4 (about twice the value from RAL). The cut-off frequency
of a longitudinal area with A
long
around 4 (dashed gray line in Fig. 11) is:

long long
wind win
cut long
A A
long
d
U U
f
a A a =

=

=
,
4 4
0.680 2.7 4 217 (23)

For a wind speed of
wind
U ~ 10 m/s and a wind farm of a = 3 km longitudinal dimension,
the cut-off frequency is in the order of 2,26 mHz.
In accordance with experimental measures, turbulence fluctuations quicker than a few
minutes are notably smoothed in the wind farm output. This relation is proportional to the
dimensions of the area where the wind turbines are sited. That is, if the dimensions of the
zone are doubled, the area is four times the original region and the cut-off frequencies are
halved. In other words, the smoothing of the aggregated wind is proportional to the longitudinal
and lateral distances of the zone (and thus, related to the square root of the area if zone shape is
maintained).
In sum, the lateral cut-off frequency is inversely proportional to the site parameters A
lat
and
the longitudinal cut-off frequency is only slightly dependent on A
long
. Note that the
longitudinal cut-off frequency show closer agreement for Hvsre and RAL since it is
dominated by frozen turbulence hypothesis.
However, if transversal or longitudinal smoothing dominates, then the cut-off frequency is
approximately the minimum of
cut lat
f
,
and
cut long
f
,
. The system behaves as a first order
system at frequencies above both cut-off frequencies, and similar to order system in
between
cut lat
f
,
and
cut long
f
,
.

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Fig. 11. Normalized ratio PSD
Ueq,area
(f) /PSD
Ueq,turbine
(f) for transversal (solid thick black
line) and longitudinal areas (dashed dark gray line for A
long
= 4, long dashed light gray line
for A
long
= 1,8). Horizontal axis is expressed in either longitudinal and lateral adimensional
frequency a A
long
f /U
wind
or b A
lat
f /U
wind
.
7. Spectrum and coherence estimated from the weather station network
The network of weather stations provides a wide coverage of slow variations of wind. Many
stations provide hourly or half-hourly data. These data is used in the program
WINDFREDOM (Mur-Amada, 2009) to compute the wind spectra and the coherences
between nearby locations.
Quick fluctuations of wind are more related to the turbine integrity, structural forces and
control issues. But they are quite local, and they cancel partially among clusters of wind
farm. The slower fluctuations are more cumbersome from the grid point of view, since they
have bigger coherences with small phase delays.
The coherence and the spectrum of wind speed oscillations up to 12 days are analyzed, as an
illustrative example, at the airports of the Spanish cities of Logroo and Zaragoza. Both
cities are located in the Ebro River and share a similar wind regime. The weather stations are
140,5 km apart (see Fig. 12) and the analysis is based on one year data, from October 2008 to
October 2009.
The spectrograms in Fig. 13 and Fig. 14 show the evolution of the power spectrum of the
signal, computed from consecutive signal portions of 12 days. The details of the estimation
procedure can be found in the annexes of this thesis.
Wind spectra and coherence has been computed from the periodogram, and the
spectrograms of the signals are also shown to inform of the variability of the frequency
content. The quartiles and the 5% and 95% quantiles of the wind speed are also shown in the
lower portions of in Fig. 13 and Fig. 14. The unavailable data have been interpolated
between the nearest available points. Some measurements are outliers, as it can be noticed
from the 5% quantiles in Fig. 13 and Fig. 14, but they have not been corrected due to the lack
of further information.
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Fig. 12. Map from WINDFREDOM program with the location of Zaragoza and Logroo in
the Iberian Peninsula.
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Fig. 13. Periodogram and spectrogram of Zaragoza airport (Spain) estimated with
WINDFREDOM program.
Outliers
Diurnal
variations
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Fig. 14. Periodogram and spectrogram of Logroo airport (Spain) estimated with
WINDFREDOM program.
Outliers
Semi-diurnal
variations
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The diurnal and semi-diurnal variation peaks can be recognized in clearly in the
periodograms of Fig. 13 and Fig. 14 (gray graph on the left) or as dark-bluish horizontal
lines in the spectrogram (colour image on the right). The oscillation magnitude is
not constant along one year because the horizontal lines get lighter or darker along the
time.
The ratio between the periodograms and spectrograms of Fig. 13 and Fig. 14 is shown in Fig.
15. The wind in Zaragoza airport meteorological station (LEZG for short) is the double in
average than in the weather station of Logroo airport (LELO for sort). The average ratio is
about 0,4~0,6, indicating that the ratio of oscillation amplitudes are around 0,4~0,6. The
coefficient of variation (standard deviation divided by the mean) is 87% in Logroo and 70%
in Zaragoza.
The quartiles of the time series at Logroo and Zaragoza (lower graph in Fig. 15) show
significant differences. The red shadow indicates the interquartile range of Zaragoza and the
thick red line is its median (the blue colours correspond to Zaragoza). The wind in Logroo
(in blue) is about half the wind in Zaragoza in average.
The wind variations in each station show different features eventually. Some variations are
replicated on the other station but with some non-systematic delay and with different
magnitude. These features are the reason of the relatively small coherence of the two
stations.
In practice, the oscillations observed in one station are seen, in some extent, in other station
with some delay or in advance. The coherence

#1,#2
is a complex magnitude with
modulus between 0 and 1 and a phase, which represent the delay (positive angles) or the
advance (negative angles) of the oscillations in the second weather station respect the first
one (considered the reference). Since the spectrum of a signal is complex, the argument of
the coherence ( )
rc
f

is the average phase difference of the fluctuations.

The coherence ( )
rc
f

indicates the correlation degree and the time pattern of the

fluctuations. The modulus is analogous to the correlation coefficient of the spectrum lines
from both locations. If the ratio among complex power spectrums shown in Fig. 15 is
constant (in modulo and in phase), then the coherence is the unity and its argument is the
average phase difference. If the complex ratio is random (in modulo or in phase, then the
coherence is null.
However, the wind direction is not considered in this estimation, but it has a great impact
on the coherence estimate. The time delay between oscillations depends greatly on the
wind direction. Thus, the phase difference of the fluctuations, = 2f , can change notably
and this would lead to very low coherences. If there are several preferential wind directions,
the phase difference can experience great variability. In such cases, a more detailed model
maybe using Markov states indicating prevailing wind directions is needed.
The red/purple colours in Fig. 15 indicate that phase difference is near 0 up to
0,5 cycles/day (small delay of fluctuations). However, the phase difference at frequencies
above 2 cycles/day is quite big, indicating that the timing sequence of the fluctuations has
varied along the study period (one year).


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Fig. 15. Periodogram and spectrogram of Logroo airport divided by the ones of Zaragoza
airport (estimated by WINDFREDOM program).
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Fig. 16. Phase difference between the periodogram and spectrogram of Zaragoza airport
respect the ones of Logroo airport (estimated by WINDFREDOM program).
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8. References
2009/28/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2009 on the
promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources and amending and
subsequently repealing Directives 2001/77/EC and 2003/30/EC.
Akhmatov, V. & Knudsen, H. (2002). An aggregate model of a grid-connected, large scale,
offshore wind farm for power stability investigations-importance of windmill
mechanical system. Electrical Power Systems 24 (2002) 709-717.
Anderson, C. L.; Cardell, J. B. (2008), Reducing the Variability of Wind Power Generation for
Participation in Day Ahead Electricity Markets, Proceedings of the 41st Hawaii
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Wind Power
Edited by S M Muyeen
ISBN 978-953-7619-81-7
Hard cover, 558 pages
Publisher InTech
Published online 01, June, 2010
Published in print edition June, 2010
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