Mesoscale modeling of offshore wind turbine wakes at the wind farm resolving scale: a composite-based analysis with the Weather Research and Forecasting model over Horns Rev

The use of mesoscale modeling to reproduce the power deficits associated with wind turbine wakes in an offshore environment is analyzed. The study is based on multiyear (3years) observational and modeling results at the Horns Rev wind farm. The simulations are performed with the Weather Research and Forecasting mesoscale model configured at a high horizontal resolution of 333m over Horns Rev. The wind turbines are represented as an elevated momentum sink and a source of turbulent kinetic energy. Composites with different atmospheric conditions are extracted from both the observed and simulated datasets in order to inspect the ability of the model to reproduce the power deficit in a wide range of atmospheric conditions. Results indicate that mesoscale models such as Weather Research and Forecasting are able to qualitatively reproduce the power deficit at the wind farm scale. Some specific differences are identified. Mesoscale modeling is therefore a suitable framework to analyze potential downstream effects associated with offshore wind farms. Copyright (c) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.