Assessment of Large-Scale Offshore Wind Farm Effects | March 2024

Assessment of Large-Scale Offshore Wind Farm Effects and Their Implications for Maritime Spatial Planning.
Dr. Martin Dörenkämper
HEAD OF NUMERICAL YIELD AND SITE ASSESSMENT FRAUNHOFER INSTITUTE FOR WIND ENERGY SYSTEMS
The Ostend declaration foresees the North Sea as Europe’s Green power plant and has therefore set ambitious targets for offshore wind of 120 GW by 2030 and 300 GW by 2050. As such, areas like the German Bight will in the future see the highest capacity densities in the world. To this end, there has been a history of research on the interaction between atmosphere and wind farms and, more recently, projects on mitigation strategies. This presentation will outline past, recently completed and ongoing research activities assessing the interaction of large-scale wake effects with the atmospheric boundary layer, focusing on the German Bight. Results from scanning-lidar and airborne measurement campaigns and wind farm production data used to improve and validate mesoscale and engineering models will be presented.
Moreover, the main results of the X-Wakes project will be summarized with a special attention to the implications of large-scale wake effects for maritime spatial planning. The webinar will conclude with a discussion on how to mitigate those large-scale effects in the future.