Scientists and experts from Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark are working on methods to increase the accuracy of forecasts of wake effects in offshore wind farms.
The research aims to enable optimised maritime spatial planning and allow reliable forecasting of power production.
In the North Sea, dense installations of offshore wind farms are planned in several regions.
The resulting wake effects of large offshore wind farm clusters are of great importance for the calculation of energy yields.
Current models often only allow for an inaccurate representation of these effects, the Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy Systems IWES said.
The Institute has joined forces with its partners Technical University of Denmark, Delft University of Technology, Deutscher Wetterdienst, Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, Pondera Consult, EMD International, DHI and the associated partners RWE, BP, EnBW and TotalEnergies.
The research project started in late 2024 and is funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) in Germany, Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Programme (EUDP) in Denmark and The Netherlands Enterprise Agency RVO as part of the EU initiative Clean Energy Transition Partnership (CETP).
The European countries bordering the North Sea have set an expansion target for offshore wind energy: At least 260GW of offshore wind capacity is to be installed by 2050.
The world’s densest installation of offshore wind turbines is expected in parts of the North Sea – with an impact on foreseeable power production.
So-called wake effects will be very evident. The area downstream of the rotor surface is referred to as the wake.
Due to the removal of momentum from the flow, this area has a reduced wind speed and an increased degree of turbulence due to the mixing with the undisturbed flow.
This significantly reduces the electricity yields in the wake-affected wind farms.
The EuroWindWakes project team is working on models that help to minimize efficiency losses of offshore wind turbines through optimized wind farm planning.
Current models used to calculate energy yields can only depict these wake effects with great uncertainty.
The project partners aim to reduce the inaccuracy of the predictions from 20-30% to 10% by improving and validating existing methods.
This increased forecast accuracy will enable optimised transnational maritime spatial planning and a more accurate forecast of power production.
The EuroWindWakes team creates an essential prerequisite for exploiting the enormous potential of offshore wind energy.
It is also an important influencing factor commercially, as uncertainty about the performance of wind turbines and wind farms has a significant impact on the profitability of offshore locations.
Dr Bernhard Stoevesandt, project coordinator at Fraunhofer IWES, said: “All three countries involved have already carried out large-scale wake research on smaller scales.
“EuroWindWakes reduces uncertainty in the assessment of long-distance wake effects on the North Sea scale, enabling optimal asset siting in applications like maritime spatial planning.”
Jake Badger, head of section for resource assessment and meteorology, at DTU Wind and Energy Systems, Technical University of Denmark, added: “The fact that the collaborating countries are North Sea neighbors opens opportunities to really work on cross-border effects of wind farms, and bring together stakeholders, including authorities, to use our methods and results in relation to long-term planning.”
Anja Schönnebeck, national project coordinator at Pondera Consult said: “The prediction of wake effects from neighbouring wind farms on the energy yield of an offshore wind farm varies significantly depending on the chosen wake model.
“This variation introduces high uncertainties in the financial planning of offshore wind farms.
“The EuroWindWakes project aims to reduce these uncertainties, improving the reliability of energy yield predictions.”
At the kick-off meeting in February 2025, the project partners met to discuss the upcoming steps in the project.
Fraunhofer IWES is responsible for the coordination of the overall project. The project will run for three years.