Evaluation of wind loads and the potential of Turkey's south west region by using log-normal and gamma distributions

In this study, wind data such as speeds, loads and potential of Mugla which is located in the southwest of Turkey were statistically analyzed. The wind data which consists of hourly wind speed between 2010 and 2013 years, was measured at the 10-meters height in four different ground stations (Datca, Fethiye, Marmaris, Koycegiz). These stations are operated by The Turkish State Meteorological Service (T.S.M.S). Furthermore, wind data was analyzed by using Log-Normal and Gamma distributions, since these distributions fit better than Weibull, Normal, Exponential and Logistic distributions. Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) and the coefficients of the goodness of fit (R-2) were also determined by using statistical analysis. According to the results, extreme wind speed in the research area was 33 m/s at the Datca station. The effective wind load at this speed is 0.68 kN/m(2) . The highest mean power densities for Datca, Fethiye, Marmaris and Koycegiz were found to be 46.2, 1.6, 6.5 and 2.2 W/m(2) , respectively. Also, although Log-normal distribution exhibited a good performance i.e. lower AD (Anderson - Darling statistic (AD) values) values, Gamma distribution was found more suitable in the estimation of wind speed and power of the region.