Вы находитесь на странице: 1из 12

Energy Syst (2014) 5:507–518

DOI 10.1007/s12667-013-0101-5

ORIGINAL PAPER

An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine

Abhik Kumar Das

Received: 22 October 2013 / Accepted: 8 November 2013 / Published online: 13 March 2014
© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014

Abstract The power curve of a wind turbine grows exponentially as a function of


wind-velocity if the measured wind-velocity varies between the cut-in velocity and
the rated velocity. In this study, we propose an empirical, two-parameter explicit model
of the power curve for a wind turbine. The model generalizes different turbine power
curves and provides an easy estimate to compare various turbine characteristics. The
energy analysis of the wind turbine is done using the (proposed) functional relationship
and demonstrates how the capacity factor of a wind turbine varies with these empirical
factors.

Keywords Wind turbine · Velocity–power curve · Empirical model ·


Capacity factor

1 Introduction

A wind energy conversion system is a focal point in research conducted on renewable


energy sources. The conversion of wind energy to electrical energy is generally done by
a wind turbine. Performance of a wind turbine can be characterized by a power curve.
Even without detailed knowledge of a turbine’s design or its components, the power
output, capacity factor and energy production of the turbine can be predicted using
the power curve. This curve can be used for planning purposes, estimating total wind
power production, matching optimum turbine-site and ranking potential sites [1–6].
The power curve of a wind turbine has four distinct regions. For wind velocity
ranging from 0 to the cut-in velocity (VI ), the turbine does not produce any power.
Between the cut-in velocity and rated velocity (V R ), power increases with wind veloc-

A. K. Das (B)
Center for study of Science, Technology and Policy, Bangalore, India
e-mail: abhik@cstep.in

123
508 A. K. Das

ity. From rated velocity to cut-out velocity (Vo ), power remains constant irrespective
of the change in wind velocity. Beyond the cut-out velocity the turbine is shut down
due to safety considerations. Though one can generate the power curve of a wind-
turbine using experimental values, an approximate explicit analytical representation
of the power curve is useful to simulate the energy output of the turbine. In the region
between the cut-in velocity (VI ) and rated velocity (V R ), the power-curve character-
istics can be expressed using different models like linear, quadratic and cubic [7–11].
In this paper, an explicit functional model of the power curve of a wind turbine
is proposed using two empirical parameters. The explicit analytical equation gives a
satisfactory result for the whole region between cut-in velocity and rated velocity for
a wide variety of commercially available wind turbines.
This paper is organized as follows: Sect. 2 describes available power curve models.
Section 3 introduces the proposed empirical model of the power curve characteristics
of a wind turbine and shows the value of empirical parameters for a wide variety of wind
turbines. Section 4 compares different models of the power curve of a turbine. Section
5 describes the formulation of the capacity-factor of a turbine using the proposed
model and the Weibull distribution. Finally, Sect. 6 presents the conclusion.

2 Power curve model of wind turbine

Considering PV as the power at wind-velocityV and PR as the rated power at velocity


V R , the simplest explicit power curve can be represented as a linear model which
assumes a linear increase in the turbine power. The linear model can be represented as:

V − VI
PV = PR (1)
VR − VI

However, this model overestimates the wind power value when the velocity is near
cut-in velocity VI and underestimates the same when the velocity is near the rated
velocityV R . A better estimation of the power curve can be achieved by using the cubic
model [7] which assumes a constant overall efficiency of the turbine in the region
between the cut-in velocity (VI ) and rated velocity (V R ) as:

(V − VI )3
PV = PR (2)
(V R − VI )3

Another version of the cubic model described in [8] is very similar to Eq. (2) but does
not consider the cut-in velocity (VI ) and can be represented as:

V3
PV = PR (3)
V R3

The quadratic model of the velocity–power curve of a wind turbine can be represented
as described in [9]:

PV = PR (a0 + a1 V + a2 V 2 ) (4)

123
An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine 509

The method to calculate these coefficients is available in [10]. These coefficients are
determined based on the assumption that the output of the turbines follows the cubic
model shown in Eq. (2). A better version of quadratic model is available in [11] and
can be represented as:

V 2 − VI2
PV = PR (5)
V R2 − VI2

The quadratic model in Eq. (5) is generalized in [12]:

V n − VIn
PV = PR (6)
V Rn − VIn

Here n can be defined as the velocity power proportionality constant. In [13,14] a third
order polynomial was used to represent the turbine output and regression was used
to find the coefficients. The explicit analytical models described in [7–14] are useful
to approximate the velocity power response of wind-turbine in some small, specific
region between the cut-in velocity and rated velocity, but they do not represent the
velocity–power characteristics in the whole region between the cut-in velocity and the
rated velocity of commercially available wind turbines.

3 Proposed power curve model of wind turbine

Let the normalized power be pand the normalized wind velocity be v. Further, p can
be defined as PV /PR and v can be defined as V /V R . This normalization enables a
compact representation of PV and V , when 0 ≤ V ≤ V R for different wind turbines
in [0, 1] × [0, 1] space. The normalized representation shows that the velocity–power
curve fits a wide variety of [PV , V ] values accurately,
 α
p =1− 1−v
1−vi eβ(v−vi ) , for vi ≤ v ≤ 1
(7)
=0 for 0 ≤ v < vi

Here vi is a constant = VI / V R and the two empirical parameters α and β depend on


the design of the wind-turbine. The nature of the curve is shown in Fig. 1 for different
values of α and β. Figure 2 shows a fit of the proposed model with the actual wind
velocity–power data of the turbine (the data are in Table 1). According to Eq. (7),
when v = vi , p is zero and for v = 1, pbecomes 1 asymptotically. These satisfy the
boundary conditions of the normalized power curve in Eq. (7) in the [0,1] × [0,1]
space. Also, as shown in Fig. 1, p increases with α but decreases with increasing β.
From Eq. (7), we have:
 α  
dp 1−v α
= eβ(v−vi ) −β (8)
dv 1 − vi 1−v

123
510 A. K. Das

Fig. 1 Representative curves showing the behavior of p for different values of α and β with vi = 0.2

Fig. 2 Normalized wind


velocity–power curve of the
turbine where the line shows the
functional form (Eq. 2) and the
points shows the normalized
data points of the wind
velocity–power data. The data
and the empirical factors α and
β are taken from the Table 1

for all v between vi and 1. From the velocity–power data of a wide variety of turbines
(Table 1), it is easy to see that dp/dv tends to zero when vtends to vi , i.e. the power
curve becomes parallel to the x-axis while vis very close to vi . Hence, by putting
v = vi and dp/dv ≈ 0 in Eq. (8), we get

α ≈ (1 − vi )β (9)

Thus, the two parameter model can also be represented as single parameter model
with some approximation as,
 β(1−vi )
1−v
p =1− eβ(v−vi ) , for vi ≤ v ≤ 1 (10)
1 − vi

The proposed two parameter model is used to approximate a wide variety of manu-
facturer turbine data available at [15] and some of the results are presented in Table 1.
According to this, the empirical factors α and β can be determined using simple curve-
fitting method (error minimization) of limited available data points of the turbine. The
power curves using the proposed model are represented in Fig. 3 for different turbines
and show a close match with actual data points.

4 Comparison of different power curve models

In Fig. 4, the proposed model is compared with other linear, quadratic and cubic models
described in [7–14] for the turbine GE 1.5 SL. Other available models [7–14] either
overestimate or underestimate the behavior of the velocity–power characteristics of
commercially available wind turbine.

123
Table 1 Wind velocity and power data of wind turbines (air density 1.225 kg/m3 )

Wind Suzlon GE wind energy Bergey Vestas RE power Turbo winds


turbine Inland

Wind S.62/ S.64/ S.60/ S.64/ S.66/ GE 900 GE 1.5S GE 1.5SL BWC-S BWC-R V27/ V80/ RE power MM 82 MD 77 T600-52
speed (m/s) 1000 1000 1250 1250 1250 225 1800 48/600

Power (kW)
0.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3.00 11 16 10 16 17 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 2 5
4.00 26 37 26 37 40 17 36 43 0.25 0.25 3 7 20 66 44 25
An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine

5.00 83 100 78 100 106 55 104 131 0.80 0.80 15 109 52 153 129 60
6.00 154 181 145 181 193 110 2.5 250 1.65 1.65 33 253 88 279 241 118
7.00 245 287 230 287 306 184 344 416 3.65 2.55 55 443 152 462 396 154
8.00 372 451 350 451 481 283 528 640 4.85 3.65 82 682 239 702 594 269
9.00 565 645 530 645 687 409 774 924 6.15 4.85 115 968 318 981 846 411
10.00 758 861 704 861 917 577 1,079 1,181 7.5 6.15 150 1,286 418 1,251 1,100 538
11.00 893 1,000 860 1,085 1,156 739 1,342 1,359 9.00 7.50 180 1,582 490 1,545 1,318 600
12.00 1,000 1,000 980 1,250 1,250 851 1,460 1,436 9.5 8.00 208 1,748 556 1,817 1,467 600
13.00 1,000 1,000 1,120 1,250 1,250 892 1,494 1,481 10.0 8.00 218 1,793 590 2,000 1,500 600
14.00 1,000 1,000 1,250 1,250 1,250 899 1,500 1,494 8.0 8.00 224 1,799 605 2,000 1,500 600
15.00 1,000 1,000 1,250 1,250 1,250 900 1,500 1,500 6.0 7.00 225 1,800 610 2,000 1,500 600

123
511
512

123
Table 1 continued

Wind Suzlon GE wind energy Bergey Vestas RE power Turbo winds


turbine Inland

Wind S.62/ S.64/ S.60/ S.64/ S.66/ GE 900 GE 1.5S GE 1.5SL BWC-S BWC-R V27/ V80/ RE power MM 82 MD 77 T600-52
speed (m/s) 1000 1000 1250 1250 1250 225 1800 48/600

Power curve parameters


V I (m/s) 2.00 2.00 2.00 2.00 2.00 3.00 3.50 3.00 3.00 3.00 3.00 3.00 2.00 3.00 2.00 2.00
V R (m/s) 12.0 11.0 14.0 12.0 12.0 15.0 14.0 15.0 13.0 12.0 15.0 15.0 14.00 13.0 13.0 11.0
PR (kW) 1,000 1,000 1,250 1,250 1,250 900 1,500 1,500 10 8.00 225 1,800 600 2,000 1,500 600
Model parameters
vi 0.17 0.18 0.14 0.17 0.17 0.2 0.26 0.21 0.21 0.25 0.2 0.2 0.14 0.23 0.15 0.18
α 1.7 1.5 1.8 1.4 1.7 3.8 2.9 4.5 2.1 1.80 3.7 4.7 2.8 1.6 2.3 1.6
β 2.1 1.9 2.1 1.7 2.1 4.9 3.8 5.7 2.3 2.00 4.6 6.1 3.4 1.8 2.8 2.1
A. K. Das
An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine 513

Fig. 3 The wind


velocity–power curve of the
turbine where the points
represent the actual data-points
of wind velocity–power data of
different turbines (Table 1) and
the line represents the curve
derived from the normalized
functional form (Eq. 2). The
curve shows the nature of the
curve in the region of 0 to the
rated velocity V R

Fig. 4 The normalized wind


velocity–power curves of the
turbine using different models
[7–14] and the proposed model
for the wind-turbine GE 1.5SL
(Table 1)

For each wind turbine in Table 1, the normalized velocity–power characteristics


are approximated using the proposed explicit model (7) and other available models
(1–6); and their respective root-mean-square (rms) error is calculated using the actual
manufacture data and the modeled data. The rms error of different models of velocity
power curve for a wide variety of commercially available turbines is shown in Table 2.
The proposed model shows lower error compared to the other modeling approaches
and hence gives a satisfactory approximation of the velocity power characteristics of
wind turbine.

5 Capacity factor of turbine using proposed power curve model

One of the major applications of the proposed power curve model is to calculate the
capacity factor of a wind turbine. The capacity factor (C F ) of a wind turbine can be
defined as the ratio of the energy actually produced by the turbine to the energy that
could be produced by it, if the turbine had been always operating at its rated power.
The capacity factor depends on the nature of wind regime as well as on the turbine
characteristics.
Being a stochastic phenomenon, the speed and direction of wind vary widely by
time. A wide range of statistical distribution reflecting the wind velocity pattern exists.
The Weibull distribution, which can be viewed as a special case of Pierson class
III distribution, is well accepted and commonly used in energy analysis [13]. The
probability function of the Weibull distribution (which represents the wind variation
with an acceptable level of approximation) can be represented as:

123
514 A. K. Das

Table 2 Root-mean-square error of different models of normalized velocity power curves for a wide-variety
of commercially available turbines

Linear (1) Cubic (2) Cubic (3) Quadratic (4) Quadratic (5) n-degree (6) Proposed
model (7)

S.62/1000 0.1435 0.1970 0.1476 0.0575 0.0872 0.0845 0.0228


S.64/1000 0.1744 0.1032 0.0523 0.0474 0.0592 0.0332 0.0081
S.60/1250 0.1400 0.1509 0.1083 0.0407 0.0443 0.0443 0.0189
S.64/1250 0.1726 0.1055 0.0574 0.0398 0.0529 0.0309 0.0087
S.66/1250 0.1599 0.1298 0.0827 0.0451 0.0532 0.0473 0.0104
GE 900 0.1102 0.3010 0.2381 0.0902 0.1622 0.1102 0.0217
GE 1.5S 0.0903 0.2769 0.1903 0.0687 0.1238 0.0873 0.0182
GE 1.5SL 0.1138 0.3440 0.2756 0.0918 0.1948 0.1083 0.0131
BWC-S 0.0702 0.2367 0.1688 0.0421 0.0900 0.0538 0.0095
BWC-R 0.0832 0.2030 0.1207 0.0370 0.0544 0.0419 0.0106
V27/225 0.0945 0.3072 0.2429 0.0804 0.1632 0.0943 0.0069
V80/1800 0.1191 0.3352 0.2713 0.0995 0.1923 0.1162 0.0149
RE power 0.0762 0.2651 0.1957 0.0586 0.1193 0.0722 0.0080
48/600
MM 82 0.0860 0.2351 0.1611 0.0528 0.0922 0.0684 0.0087
MD 77 0.1224 0.1995 0.1542 0.0561 0.0840 0.0746 0.0086
T600-52 0.1745 0.1144 0.0674 0.0563 0.0665 0.0496 0.0237

 k−1  k
k V − Vc
f (V ) = e (11)
c c

where k is the Weibull shape factor, c is the scale factor and V is the velocity under
consideration. The cumulative distribution function F(V ) of the Weibull distribution
can be represented as:

  k
− Vc
F(V ) = f (V )d V = 1 − e (12)

The probability density function f (V ) represents the fraction of time (or probability)
during which the wind blows with a specific velocity and F(V ) represents the fraction
of time (or probability) that the wind velocity is equal or lower than V . Hence, the
energy contributed by V , per unit time per unit rotor area can be calculated as PV ∗ f (V ),
where PV represents the power available at the velocity V . Considering all possible
wind-velocities, the total energy density E D can be expressed as,

Vo
ED = PV f (V )d V (13)
VI

123
An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine 515

Considering two distinct productive regions of turbine: from VI to V R and V R to Vo ,


we can state that,

E D = E IR + E RO (14)

where E IR and E RO are the energy-density yields corresponding to VI to V R and V R


to Vo . In other words,

VR
E IR = PV f (V )d V (15)
VI
VO
E RO = PR f (V )d V (16)
VR

Using Eqs. (7), (15) can be transformed into,

VR
E IR = PR f (V )d V − I (17)
VI

wherein,

1  α
1−v
I = PR eβ(v−vi ) f (vV R )dv (18)
1 − vi
vi

Using Eqs. (14), (16) and (17), the energy density E D can be represented as,

VO
E D = PR f (V )d V − I (19)
VI

Using Eqs. (12), (19) can be transformed into


      

VI k VO k
E D = PR exp − − exp − −I (20)
c c

Here I can be expressed as:

  1  v k−1
PR V Rk−1 k v
I = (1 − v)α exp β(v − vi ) − V Rk ( )k dv (21)
(1 − vi )α c c c
vi

123
516 A. K. Das

Hence the capacity factor, C F can be represented as:


      

ED VI k VO k
CF = = exp − − exp − −J (22)
PR c c

where J = I /PR and can be represented as

  1  k−1  k 
V Rk−1 k α v k v
J= (1 − v) exp β(v − vi ) − V R dv (23)
(1 − vi )α c c c
vi

As depicted in the calculations above, the integral part of theJ can be calculated numer-
ically for different values of β, k and c. For similar cut-in velocity VI , rated velocity
V R and cut-out velocity Vo , the different wind turbine power curve characteristics can
be represented using their respective α and β parameters. Using the approximated
relation, a ≈ (1 − vi )β the power curve characteristics of different turbines can be
compared using the single parameter value β (or α). The numerical computation of
the integral part of J in Eq. (23) depends on (a) the turbine empirical factor β, (b) the
normalized cut-in velocity VI , (c) the Weibull shape factor k and (d) the Weibull scale
factor c. It is interesting to see that the capacity factor of the turbine depends on the
parameter β for different set of (k, c, vi ) values.

Fig. 5 The capacity factor of wind turbine for different parameter value β a for fixed scale factor c and
different shape factor k, b for fixed shape factor k and different scale factor c and c for different normalized
cut-in velocity vi

123
An empirical model of power curve of a wind turbine 517

For the graphs in Fig. 5a and b, we consider that the turbines have similar cut-in
velocity VI = 2 m/s, rated velocity V R = 12 m/s and cut-out velocity Vo = 20 m/s, but
differ in their respective β. Table 1 shows that the choice of the values in cut-in velocity,
rated velocity and cut-out velocity is based on industry standards and the availability
of existing wind turbines. As shown in Fig. 4, the capacity factor C F increases with
increasing β. Figure 5a shows the capacity factor of turbine where the Weibull scale
factor c is fixed and the shape factor k is varying. Similarly, in Fig. 5b it is shown how
the capacity factor varies when the scale factor c changes when k is fixed. In both cases,
it is easy to note that the capacity factor increases when the turbine parameter value
β increases. In Fig. 5c, the capacity factor vs. β curves are for different normalized
cut-in velocity vi . Since vi exists in the lower limit of the integral part of J in Eq. (23),
it is expected that the capacity factor will be higher for lower vi . The results show that
the higher the β, the better the capacity factor of the wind turbine.

6 Conclusion

This paper considers an empirical, two-parameter model to represent the power curve
data of wind turbine. The empirical factors α and β can be generated using the limited
data points of the power curve. The functional form obtained when using these two
parameters shows a satisfactory match with a wide variety of actual power curve data of
different turbines. The proposed model generalizes the power curve of different wind
turbines and can be used to compare their power curve characteristics. The proposed
model is compared with other existing models for different commercially available
wind turbines and shows a better approximation of the power curve characteristics.
The functional representation of the proposed model can be used for calculating the
capacity factor of wind turbine if the nature of the wind regime is known. The paper
also considers the Weibull density function to characterize the wind distribution and
the proposed model is used to calculate the capacity factor of the turbine given such
a distribution. The numerical analysis of the energy density and capacity factor is
computationally feasible due to the explicit representation in the model. It is interesting
to see that the higher the empirical parameter values, better the capacity factor of the
wind turbine.

Acknowledgments The author wishes to thank the reviewers of this article for their feedback, Dr.
Anshu Bharadwaj, Executive Director, Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP),
Bangalore, India for his continuous support; Dr. Annapoorna Ravichander and Mr. Bishal Mazumdar,
CSTEP, Bangalore, India for their help in creating this manuscript.

References

1. Jangamshetti, S.H., Rau, V.G.: Site matching of wind turbine generators: a case study. IEEE Trans.
Energy Convers. 14, 1537–1543 (1999)
2. Jangamshetti, S.H., Rau, V.G.: Normalized power curves as a tool for identification of optimum wind
turbine generator parameters. IEEE Trans. Energy Convers. 16, 283 (2001)
3. Tai-Her, Y., Li, W.: A study on generator capacity for wind turbines under various tower heights and
rated wind speeds using Weibull distribution. IEEE Trans. Energy Convers. 23, 592–602 (2008)
4. Albadi, M.H., El-Saadany, E.F.: Optimum turbine-site matching. Energy 35, 3593–3602 (2010)

123
518 A. K. Das

5. Hu, S., Cheng, J.: Performance evaluation of pairing between sites and wind turbines. Renew. Energy
32(11), 1934–1947 (2007)
6. Pallabazzer, R.: Parametric analysis of wind siting efficiency. J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 91(11),
1329–1352 (2003)
7. Dialynas, E.N., Machias, A.V.: Reliability modelling interactive techniques of power systems including
wind generating units. ArchivFuerElektrotechnik 72, 33–41 (1989)
8. Salameh, Z.M., Safari, I.: Optimum windmill-site matching. IEEE Trans. Energy Convers. 7, 669–676
(1992)
9. Justus, CG., Hargraves, WR., Yalcin, A.: Nationwide assessment of potential output from wind-
powered generators. J. Appl. Meteorol. 15 (1976)
10. Giorsetto, P., Utsurogi, KF.: Development of a new procedure for reliability modeling of wind turbine
generators. IEEE Trans. Power Apparatus Syst. 102, 134–143 (1983)
11. Pallabazzer, R.: Evaluation of wind-generator potentiality. Solar Energy 55, 49–59 (1995)
12. Mathew, S., Philip, G.S.: Advances in Wind Energy Conversion Technology. Springer, New York
(2011)
13. Celik, AN.: Energy output estimation for small scale wind power generators using Weibull-
representative wind data. J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 91, 693–707 (2003)
14. Chang, T.J., Tu, Y.L.: Evaluation of monthly capacity factor of WECS using chronological and prob-
abilistic wind speed data: a case study of Taiwan. Renew. Energy 32, 1999–2010 (2007)
15. https://inlportal.inl.gov/portal/server.pt/community/wind_power/424. Accessed 2 August 2013

123

Вам также может понравиться