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| Titel |
A Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) as a Measurement Tool for Wind-Energy Research |
| VerfasserIn |
Norman Wildmann, Jens Bange |
| Konferenz |
EGU General Assembly 2014
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| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
Englisch
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| Digitales Dokument |
PDF |
| Erschienen |
In: GRA - Volume 16 (2014) |
| Datensatznummer |
250091980
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| Publikation (Nr.) |
 EGU/EGU2014-6300.pdf |
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| Zusammenfassung |
| In wind energy meteorology, RPA have the clear advantage compared to manned aircraft that
they allow to fly very close to the ground and even in between individual wind turbines in a
wind farm. Compared to meteorological towers and lidar systems, the advantage is the
flexibility of the system, which makes it possible to measure at the desired site on short notice
and not only in main wind direction. At the Center of Applied Geoscience at the University of
Tübingen, the research RPA MASC (Multi-purpose Airborne Sensor Carrier) was
developed. RPA of type MASC have a wingspan of about 3m and a maximum take-off
weight of 7.5kg, including payload. The standard meteorological payload includes
instruments for temperature, humidity, barometric pressure and wind measurement. It is
possible to resolve turbulence fluctuations of wind and temperature up to 20Hz.
The autopilot ROCS (Research Onboard Computer System), which is developed
at the Institute of Flight Mechanics and Control, University of Stuttgart, makes
it possible to automatically follow predefined waypoints at constant altitude and
airspeed. At a cruising speed of 24m/s and a battery life of approx. one hour, a
range of 80km is feasible. The project ’Lidar Complex’, funded by the German
Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, is
part of the research network ’WindForS’, based in Southern Germany. The goal of
the project is to establish lidar technology for wind energy plant site evaluation in
complex terrain. Additional goals are the comparison of different measurement
techniques and the validation of wind-field models in not IEC 61400 conform terrain.
It is planned to design a turbulent wind-field generator, fed by real measurement
data, which can be used to analyse WEC behaviour. Two test sites were defined
for the ’Lidar Complex’ project, one in IEC-conform terrain about 15km from
the Baltic Sea, the other in the Swabian Alb, only 2km downstream of a 100m
steep escarpment. At both sites, flight measurements were performed in 2013 with
the RPA MASC. The data that was collected allows to investigate the influence of
thermal stability of the atmosphere at the test site and turbulence intensity around
individual wind energy converters (WECs). Several measurement flights were done to
investigate the wake structure downstream a running WEC. Preliminary results
will be presented as well as an outlook for future research with the instrument. |
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