Impacts of offshore wind farms on the atmospheric environment over Taiwan Strait during an extreme weather typhoon event

Wind is one of the cleanest renewable energy resources. Through the Thousand Wind Turbines Project, Taiwan is planning to increase the proportion of power generation from renewable energy and has set a target of 5.7 GW for offshore wind by 2025. The effects of future offshore wind farms (OWFs) over the Taiwan Strait on the atmospheric environment have not been evaluated. This study examined the potential effects of proposed OWFs on the atmospheric environment if the OWFs had existed during Tropical Storm Haitang (2017) by using Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. A small set of ensemble simulations was conducted for studying the sensitivity of the ambient conditions in the region to the wind farm locations, the number and density of the turbines, and the initial time of simulations. Following the landfall and northward movement of Tropical Storm Haitang, a series of complex interactions between the typhoon circulation and the wind farm emerged, including small time slots of wake effect and mountain blocking effect. The combination of these rapidly changing OWFs-related effects contributed to a weak reduction in precipitation (- 1.08 mm) and hub-height wind speed (- 0.25 m s(-1)), as well as minimal warming near the surface (+ 0.13 degrees C) over southern Taiwan.

Automated summary

This study examined the potential effects of proposed offshore wind farms on the atmospheric environment, using simulations to analyze the interactions between typhoon circulation and wind farms. It found that the presence of wind farms resulted in a reduction in precipitation and wind speed in southern Taiwan, as well as a slight increase in surface temperature.