A wind lidar installed at Dogger Bank for the Forewind consortium has provided data which shows the technology has advanced to the stage where it could be used in future as an alternative to meteorological masts for wind data collection. The Dogger Bank projects being developed by the Forewind consortium will have a capacity of 4.8GW and, as part of their assessment process, two meteorological mast platforms were installed during 2013.
In November 2014, a ZephIR 300 wind lidar was installed on the east meteorological mast platform by SeaRoc Group to provide continuous data above the existing mast height, while the mast underwent maintenance works. The lidar collected wind speed information for four months to April 2015 and then when the meteorological mast was reinstalled in May 2015 it continued wind speed measurement at the mast’s base. Results now published confirm the lidar was available for 100 per cent of the time and correlations to the met mast were found to be excellent and at least as good as variations between individual anemoneter cups. SeaRoc has worked with Forewind since March 2013, managing the complete installation works of both the east mast which is located approximately 81 nautical miles (150 kilometres) from the UK coast, as well as the sister mast to the west. SeaRoc has now installed three Z300 lidars offshore: the NaREC metmast, Dogger Bank and the SeaZephIR, a floating platform, installed off the US East coast for a period of nearly 3 years.
