Analysis of the lightning-attractive radius for wind turbines considering the developing process of positive attachment leader

In this paper, we have presented the upward leader propagation model, considering the transition of stream leader process by the finite element method and analyzing the inception and subsequent physical processes of upward leader and the attractive radius for large wind turbines. For validating our model, the comparison of simulated results with the optically high-speed video observation shows that the model can predict an accepted result of upward leader from a 163m tall tower, the simulated upward leader velocity and length before final jump are 2.3x10(5)m/s and 187.67m presented by Warner (2010), which are very similar to the observed results of 2.8x10(5)m/s and 184m, respectively. At the same time, we find that the assumed constant speed ratio of downward/upward leader is improper and cannot accurately predict the attractive radius by lightning strike. Also, the simulated results are compared with the widely used EGM (electro geometric model), and it is found that the EGM has an obvious underestimation of attractive radius more than 50%.