THE BIG PICTURE:
Wind power is even more inefficient,
and more expensive than previously
known.
SUMMARY:
A study was needed (?) to determine what anybody who has ever taken shelter from strong winds behind a wall or a hedge already knows: The large expansion of EU offshore wind energy being planned could lead to less electricity being produced, at higher costs, because wind farms are taking the wind away from each other!
DETAILS:
Researchers from the Technical University of Denmark in Roskilde and the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany have a study titled: “Making the Most of Offshore Wind”, commissioned by the Agora Energiewende and Agora Verkehrswende think tanks.
Energy models used today by wind farm planners and investors do not capture interaction effects between wind turbines, from very large areas covered with offshore wind farms, at high installed capacity density.
Offshore wind power "farms" needs lots of space, or the full load operating time may shrink from around 4,000 hours per year currently, to between 3,000 and 3,300 hours a year.
The more turbines installed in a region, the less efficient offshore wind production becomes, due to each wind farm absorbing wind energy.
If Germany were to install 50 to 70 GW solely in the German Bight, the number of full-load hours achieved by offshore wind farms would decrease considerably.
Countries on the North and Baltic Seas should cooperate to maximize the wind yield, and full-load hours, of their offshore wind farms.
To maximize offshore wind power efficiency, the planning and development of wind farms must be coordinated across national borders. This finding is relevant to both the North and Baltic Seas.
The alternative of floating offshore wind turbine, that could be moved, would help maximize flexibility, if the original planned location calculations were wrong.