ZephIR - ControlZephIR

The Incorporation of advanced wind data from ZephIR into turbine control systems offers owner / operators the possibility of improved energy yield and load reduction by compensating the effects of yaw errors and strong wind shear. ZephIR was the first lidar to be installed on an operational turbine back in 2003. Now, Natural Power have worked with Risø DTU to achieve the world’s first lidar measurements from a rotating turbine spinner / hub.

In September 2009 Risø DTU reported their latest results from a fast data acquisition continuous wave (cw) wind lidar - ZephIR - which has been installed and operated in the rotating spinner of a large 80 m diameter, 59 m hub height Vestas NM80 wind turbine located at Tjæreborg Enge in western Denmark. To the best of Risø knowledge this achieved a “World first” successful operation of a forward looking wind lidar integrated in the spinner of an operating wind turbine. This new measurement concept has allowed an unimpeded view of the approaching wind field, which has been interrogated using several different scan patterns. Information on wind speed, shear and direction has been extracted and compared to the output from an adjacent met mast.



Torben Mikkelsen, Professor at Risø DTU, reported “Our results encourage development and integration of continuous wave wind lidar technologies in the area of active turbine control and improvement of wind turbine performance. During the test period ZephIR has shown excellent reliability and data availability was very high throughout the 4 month measurement period.”