The Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy Systems (IWES) has been contracted by the Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency of Germany (BSH) to carry out a preliminary meteorological investigation in the North Sea as part of the area development plan.
This is the fourth time the outfit has undertaken such preliminary surveys.
Two Fraunhofer IWES wind lidar buoys (light detection and ranging devices) will be deployed on each of the N-13 and N-21 sites in the German Bight for a 12-month measurement campaign.
The machines will record meteorological and oceanographic data, which will then be processed, evaluated, and complemented by comprehensive data reports to allow for efficient and economic design of future offshore wind farms.
The first two buoys have been calibrated at the wind measurement mast FINO3 and then deployed on the area N-13 in September.
The final deployment of the other two buoys at the measurement sites will take place in autumn 2023.
Both areas will be surveyed by two buoys each to give an advantage in spatial extrapolation through subsequent modelling of the data.
During the 365 days at sea, the buoys are permanently automated and manually monitored on a daily basis. The data is also continuously checked.
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