A case study of space-time performance comparison of wind turbines on a wind farm

This paper presents an academia-industry joint case study, which was conducted to quantify and compare multi-year changes in power production performance of multiple turbines scattered over a midsize wind farm. This analysis is referred to as a space-time performance comparison. One key aspect in power performance analysis is to have the wind and environmental inputs controlled for. This research employs, in a sequential fashion, two principal modeling components to exercise tight control of multiple input conditionsda covariate matching method, followed by a Gaussian process model-based functional comparison. The analysis method is applied to a wind farm that houses 66 turbines on a moderately complex terrain. The power production and environmental data span nearly four years, during which period the turbines have gone through multiple technical upgrades. The space-time analysis presents a quantitative and global picture showing how turbines differ relative to each other as well as how each of them changes over time. ? 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study conducted a space-time performance comparison of a wind farm with 66 turbines over nearly four years, taking into account wind and environmental inputs. The analysis showed quantitative and global differences among turbines and how they changed over time.