Aeolius Wind Forecasting Project

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The Aeolius Wind Forecasting Project led by Aeolius Wind Systems Pty Ltd aims to demonstrate two innovative and complementary energy forecasting technologies for use in the National Electricity Market (NEM).The technology comprises an advanced laser radar (lidar) system, designed to provide a minimum of five minutes notice of changes in the power output of wind turbines, by measuring the wind field up to fifteen kilometres upstream from wind farms.Evidence of the accuracy of the technology has been demonstrated at a wind farm on the Caribbean Island of Aruba. The ARENA project will further improve forecast accuracy so the technology can be used on sites where turbines are distributed over a large area, or where the line of site to turbines is blocked by hills, trees, and buildings.The second forecast technology involves the use of wind data collected by the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system (SCADA) at individual wind farms. Here the historical trends in wind behaviour are analysed using a neural network and/or linear model to generate the five-minute ahead forecast.The model based forecaster has been tested at a wind farm in Victoria and found to have significant improvements in accuracy over the equivalent Australian Wind Energy Forecasting System.

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