Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
OREGON ANEMOMETER LOAN PROGRAM
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Prepared By:
Energy Resources Research laboratory Oregon State University
November 20, 2004
NOTICE This publication was prepared as an account of work sponsored by the Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. Neither the Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. nor any of their contractors, subcontractors, or their employees make any warranty, express or implied, or assume any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, usefulness, or reliability of the research data, and conclusions reported herein, or of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. For these reasons and for the reason that the views, opinions, and conclusions contained in this material are those of the contractor.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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OREGON ANEMOMETER LOAN PROGRAM
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Prepared by: Philip L. Barbour Stel N. Walker, Ph.D. Energy Resources Research Laboratory Department of Mechanical Engineering Oregon State University Corvallis, OR 97331
Sponsor: Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. 733 SW Oak Street, Suite 200 Portland Oregon,97205
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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1.0
INTRODUCTION
The Oregon anemometer loan program was established in the fall of 2002 in order to assist landowners in the state evaluate the wind energy potential of their property. The program is funded by a grant from the Energy Trust of Oregon and is administered by the Energy Resources Research Laboratory at Oregon State University. The program involves several steps, beginning with a preliminary evaluation of the site. If estimates of the site show promise then a monitoring system is installed for a fixed duration (typically on year). The site is monitored regularly and the data processed and checked at regular intervals. Upon completion of the first year, the collected wind data is summarized and a report is prepared evaluating the wind data and the wind resource of the location. This report represents the final portion of the project and is designed to give the landowner the information necessary to make an informed choice about the role wind energy might play in their property. The report is separated in to sections with section 2.0 devoted to a description of the site, its location and the type of terrain found there. Section 3.0 includes a summary of the wind data collected during the study period including data quality checks and a characterization of the measured winds. In section 4.0 the wind data is analyzed to determine the amount of power production that might be expected from the site and to examine characteristics that might influence these estimates. This is followed in section 5.0 in which wind data from a nearby site is summarized and used to place the current study period in climatological context. A discussion and summary is then presented in section 6.0
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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2.0
SITE DESCRIPTION Site Name: Latitude: Longitude: Elevation: County: Sensor Height: Types of Sensors: Types of Data: Installation Date: Removal Date:
Nickel Mountain 42-58-07 123-26-14 3500 ft. Douglas 67 ft. NRG Maximum #40 wind speed NRG 200 series2 wind vane 10 min. average wind speed (mph) 10 min. std. dev. wind speed (mph) 10 min. wind direction (16 categories) August 18, 2003 @ 1510 PST Current
Site Location: Nickel Mountain is located in south-western Oregon, approximately 25 miles south of Roseburg and about four mile west of the town of Riddle. Access to the site is monitored and is located off the main road heading west from Riddle. The tower is located on the top of the mountain in a location marked on the map included in Appendix A. Site Description: Nickel Mountain resembles a tall but short ridgeline with an orientation from southwest to northeast. The highest point on the mountain is about 3527 feet which is about 2500 feet above the lower valley to the south. Other peaks of greater and lesser height can be seen to the south and west but at some distance away. The top of the mountain was the location of an open pit mining operation and consists of various pits surrounded by mounds and hills. Several roads circle the area. The surface is nearly all rocky shale with only a few trees present. The tower was placed on the northwest side of the mountain on a relatively flat area where it was believed would have good exposure to winds from all but the southeast. A picture of the tower and the top of the mountain has been included in Appendix B. Project Description: The owner of the site is interested in evaluating the site for possible installation of a small wind project. The area at the top of the mountain is somewhat limited but could allow for a small project depending on required spacing of turbines. The mountain top is not currently used for any other activities. At the base of the mountain there are retired industrial buildings associated with the prior use as a mine. It is assumed there is a substation nearby that might be of use.
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3.0
WIND CHARACTERISTICS
In the following sections, several characteristics of the winds at Nickel Mountain are examined and discussed. The goals are to evaluate the characteristics that can help explain the physical processes at work at the site and to highlight the properties that are important to assessing the wind energy potential. These evaluations are done using hourly averaged means that have been constructed using the 10 minute means recorded at the site. This is done so that existing analysis programs can be used and is not expected to have any appreciable influence on the interpretation of data. Data Recovery: The amount of data recovered during an observation period is important to characterize and should be examined to determine the confidence of other characteristics. During the initial annual period at this site, there were no problems detected that might influence the collected wind data. A table of site visits and the actions taken has been included in Appendix A. Data were plotted and scanned manually to identify any problems with the site. For the most part, data collection from the site was complete and there were no periods of missing data. However, data for several periods were removed from the records because the effects of icing were detected. This was only done for periods with a clear presence of icing and it is possible that other periods with a more limited influence occurred. Icing is identified as prolonged periods with a wind speed of 0.0 mph and a constant direction. For Nickel Mountain icing was confined to the months between December and January but was significant with nearly 30 % of data removed during December and January.
Recovery Rate (%)
10 0
80
60 40
20
0 Sep
Oct
N o v D ec
Jan
F eb
M ar A p r M ay
Jun
Jul
A ug
A nn
Figure 3.1: Data recovery by month for Nickel Mountain.
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Month
Sep
Oct
10 0
Rec. (%)
Nov
Dec
Jan
Feb
8 7
7 6
7 1
9 9
10 0
Mar
Apr
10 0
May
10 0
10 0
Jun 10 0
Jul 10 0
Aug 10 0
Ann 94. 4
Monthly Means: Monthly means are often constructed and used to determine the overall strength of the winds during different periods of the year. Monthly means show that Nickel Mountain is characterized by much stronger winds during the winter months. Somewhat surprising is the relatively low winds during the summer and during both the spring and summer transition periods. The initial evaluation of this site was based in part on observations recorded at Prairie Mountain which had shown some significant winds during these other periods as well as during the winter months. One possible explanation is that this site does not have the same wind characteristics as Prairie Mountain. Another explanation is that the period monitored here was not a typical period. This latter explanation will be examined in a later section.
Monthly Means 20
(mph)
15
10
5
0 Sep
Oct
N o v D ec
Jan
F eb
M ar A p r M ay
Jun
Jul
A ug
May
Jun
A nn
Figure 3.2: Monthly Mean Wind Speed Values for Nickel Mountain.
Month Mean (mph)
Sep 9.2
Oct 11.3
Nov 14.2
Dec 17.4
Jan 15.9
Feb 14.5
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Mar 10.8
Apr 10.9
9.1
9.7
Jul 9.7
Aug
Ann
10.1
11.7
4
Diurnal Means: The diurnal pattern of winds is an important characteristic for many wind sites and helps illuminate the mechanisms responsible for the winds. In general, a diurnal pattern is associated with a site at which strong thermal influences play a role. These are normally accentuated during the summer months when the daily heating cycle is at its greatest. Diurnal variations can also provide an indication of dependable and predictable winds at a site. For Nickel Mountain it is clear that a diurnal pattern is present during the summer months and is strong enough to show up in the mean for the annual diurnal average (Fig. 3.3). In general, the diurnal values for summer show that the winds are very light through the night and morning hours and begin to pick up around noon. The magnitude of the winds build until around 1700-1800 and taper off slowly. On average, the winds during these days are in a usable range for about 25% of the time. The winds during these periods are predominantly from the north and are a response to large-scale heating patterns. As expected, during the winter months there is little indication of a diurnal variation. In fact, the diurnal figure shows almost an inverse of this during January with lighter winds during the late afternoon hours. This is not a common pattern and may be a consequence of atmospheric stability or possibly the result of some missing data. Diurnal Mean Winds 20 18
Wind Speed (mph)
16 14 12
AVE
10
Jan Jul
8 6 4 2 0 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Hour of Day
Figure 3.3: Diurnal mean wind speed values for Nickel Mountain.
Frequency Distribution: How the wind speed at a site is distributed over various wind speed categories is an important indication of the wind resource potential of a site. An ideal site would have winds that blow at a high rate for long periods. This is not normally the case, however, and wind records from a site show a skewed distribution with a higher frequency of winds at lower speeds. Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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For Nickel Mountain (Figure 3.4) we see that the distribution is fairly typical with a low frequency of winds at the lowest range, a peak centered around 10.0 mph and a trailing tail at the upper end. In this case the peak is relatively broad or resembles a double peak structure that illustrates that it is most common to have winds in the range of 5-15 mph. This peak would likely be smoother with additional data. Over 60 % of the time the wind is within this range. The upper end is relatively low and the highest wind value observed was 44 mph. This is relatively low for a good wind site and suggests that there is a low frequency of winds at the upper end of the range. This is significant because it is at higher wind speeds where most of the potential power is produced. Relative Frequency 10 9
Frequency (%)
8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Wind Speed Category
Figure 3.4: Wind speed frequency distribution for Nickel Mountain.
Wind Rose: How the wind varies with direction is also important to understanding the physical processes that contribute to the local winds at a site and eventually in designing a wind facility. A wind rose is often used to display this information and show the frequency with which the wind occurs in different direction categories. A similar plot can be used to show the strength of the wind from each of the direction categories. For this site (Figure 3.5) it is apparent that the winds come from two general directions, the north and the south (grouping together categories). The categories show about equal frequencies with smaller values at some of the other directions. Viewing the second figure we see that the mean wind speeds for the southerly directions are much higher than for the northerly directions. This is often the case at sites in the Northwest where southerly winds associated with strong storm systems during the winter months produce much of the observed wind. The higher wind speed averages for the southerly directions
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18
18
16
16
14
14
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
suggest that this is the direction from which a majority of the energy producing winds will come from.
12 10 8 6 4 2
12 10 8 6 4 2
0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
CA LM
Direction Category
N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C ALM
Direction Category
Figure 3.5: Frequency (%) and average wind speed (mph) for each of 16 wind direction categories
In order understand better the winds at the site during different times of year; similar plots have been constructed using data from the individual months of January and July. These can be seen in figures 3.6a-d and show the dramatic difference between the two periods. For January, strong winds are present in the most frequent categories (SE, SSE, S and SSW). These four categories together account for over 80 % of the cases and for each of these, the mean wind is grater than 15.0 mph. For July, nearly 80 % of the cases are also confined to four conjoining categories. This time they are northerly (NNE, N, NNW and NW) but the mean winds for these categories are much lower. Overall this suggests that a large majority of the energy producing winds will occur in the winter when the winds are from a general southerly direction.
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January
January 25
40
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
35 30 25 20 15 10
20
15
10
5
5 0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
N
C A LM
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C A LM
Direction Category
Direction Category
July
July 25
40
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
35 30 25 20 15 10
20
15
10
5
5 0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C A LM
Direction Category
N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
Direction Category
Figure 3.6: Frequency (%) and average wind speed (mph) for each of 16 wind direction categories for the months of January and July at Nickel Mountain.
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4.0
SITE POWER CHARACTERISTICS
In order to evaluate the wind power potential at this site a number of quantities were computed using the collected wind data. As with the wind characteristics, hourly wind data was used to complete this work. The power density calculation requires air density. This is estimated assuming a standard atmosphere and the site elevation. The computed quantities include the mean and standard deviation of the hourly values, the recovery rate, the maximum one hour average, the wind power density and the frequency that the wind was observed within a wind speed range (12 mph to 60 mph). These quantities are shown in Table 4.1 and reveal a number of things about the potential for generating energy the site. First, the quantities in Table 4.1 illustrate the strong seasonal nature of the wind at this site and suggest that much of the energy potential can be found in the months between November and February. During these months nearly all of the quantities in Table 4.1 are higher, especially during December when the Mean speed was 17.4 mph and the winds were within the general operating range of a typical wind turbine (12.0 mph to 60.0 mph) about 80% of the time. Some care should be taken when interpreting this, however. A number of periods in each of these months showed the influence of icing and some data were removed. It is impossible to judge what the winds were like during these periods. To examine the overall amount of energy contained in the wind, the power density is very useful. It represents the amount of energy that would be available to a unit area each hour. The monthly mean values are shown in figure 4.1 and highlight the seasonal amount of available energy and shows how quickly the resource picks up and drops off during the transition months. For example, the power density during March is less than half that for February. Overall, the months range between 71 W/m**2 and 379 W/M**2.
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Table 4.1: Observed and computed power quantities for the wind site at Nickel Mountain. Month
Mean speed
Std.
Recovery
Max 1-Hr
Time in Range
Power Den.
Shape
Scale
(mph)
(mph)
Rate (%)
(mph)
12-60 mph(%)
W/m**2
Factor
Factor
Sept
9.2
4.7
100.0
25.1
27.9
71
2.09
10.4
Oct
11.3
6.0
100.0
30.4
43.1
137
1.99
12.8
Nov
14.2
6.8
87.2
33.0
59.2
246
2.23
16.1
Dec
17.4
6.6
76.2
37.5
80.2
379
2.87
19.6
Jan
15.9
7.6
71.4
43.9
67.8
340
2.24
17.9
Feb
14.5
7.8
99.0
39.8
59.5
288
1.95
16.3
Mar
10.8
5.7
100.0
36.7
36.4
124
1.99
12.2
Apr
10.9
5.8
100.0
36.9
39.0
123
1.99
12.2
May
9.1
5.2
100.0
23.6
32.0
77
1.82
10.2
Jun
9.7
4.9
100.0
26.0
30.8
81
2.10
10.9
Jul
9.7
4.9
100.0
23.1
35.2
82
2.09
11.0
Aug
10.1
5.0
100.0
26.0
36.7
89
2.14
11.4
ANN
11.7
6.5
94.7
43.9
44.2
160
1.89
13.1
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Nickel Mountain 400
Power Density (W/m**2)
350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 Sept
Oct
Nov
Dec
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
ANN
Figure 4.1: Monthly power density for Nickel Mountain.
In addition to evaluating these basic power characteristics it is possible to estimate how specific wind turbines might interact with the winds at a particular site. Using the collected wind data and the characteristics of a particular wind turbine it is possible to estimate the amount of power it could produce. This is done by comparing the wind data with a power curve for a specific wind turbine. A power curve is simply the curve that shows the relationship between the wind speed and the amount of power a turbine can produce. An example is provided in Figure 4.2. There are several portions of the curve that are important. At low wind speeds, below the cut-in speed, no energy is produced. Any turbine has a lower threshold below which it won’t operate. This is in part because there is little energy available at these levels. In the middle is a ramp up zone where even a small increase in wind speed results in a larger increase in power. At some point, depending on the type of turbine, the amount of power hits its rated capacity as the blades are pitched to spill energy and protect the turbine. At the upper end, energy production will stop if the winds reach a cut-out speed. This is the speed at which a turbine is shut down. In Table 4.2, energy capacity factors are shown for eight different types of turbines. The capacity factor is the ratio of the amount of energy produce to the amount of energy that could be produced if a turbine ran at its rated capacity all the time. The rated capacity is effectively a theoretical maximum and capacity factors generally range from 0.0 to 0.40. It’s difficult to compare these because of the different turbine characteristics but they are Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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given to provide a range of values that might be expected from this site. In computing these values, it is necessary to adjust the observed data which is measured at 67 feet to the hub height of the particular turbine. In this case this is done using a standard assumption that the wind follows a typical power law profile with a coefficient of 0.143. 120
Power Output (% of Rated)
100
80
60
40
20
0 0
10
20
30
40
50
Wind Speed (mph)
Figure 4.1: Sample power curve for a theoretical turbine
The capacity factors in Table 4.2 support the conclusions of the previous section and indicate that there appears to be a good winter resource available at the site. Capacity values for each of the turbine types are greatest during this period and low during the remaining months. Several turbine types have capacity factors around 0.4 for December. This is considered a good value. However, the higher wind periods are not sustained and the majority of the months have capacity factors closer to about 0.1 or 0.2. This is reflected in the annual capacity factors that are relatively low for each of the turbine types.
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Table 4.2: Capacity factors computed for Nickel Mountain using observed wind data and characteristics of eight different wind turbines. Turbine Size (kW) Hub Ht. (ft.)
Vesta 47
Vestas 80
Vestas 66
Vestas 7.5
BWC EXCEL
GE Wind 70.5
Vestas 29
Mitsubishi
660
2000
1650
55
10
1500
225
250
131
262
197
59
79
210
103
100
Sept
0.094
0.116
0.080
0.073
0.052
0.108
0.097
0.066
Oct
0.177
0.210
0.155
0.145
0.105
0.201
0.180
0.129
Nov
0.286
0.332
0.256
0.246
0.185
0.326
0.291
0.222
Dec
0.413
0.471
0.373
0.361
0.275
0.467
0.419
0.323
Jan
0.352
0.403
0.319
0.310
0.240
0.399
0.360
0.282
Feb
0.314
0.359
0.284
0.273
0.208
0.356
0.319
0.246
Mar
0.148
0.179
0.130
0.122
0.090
0.170
0.153
0.110
Apr
0.157
0.188
0.136
0.128
0.092
0.179
0.160
0.113
May
0.108
0.132
0.092
0.084
0.059
0.123
0.109
0.075
Jun
0.111
0.137
0.096
0.086
0.062
0.128
0.114
0.078
Jul
0.115
0.142
0.098
0.090
0.063
0.132
0.118
0.080
Aug
0.125
0.154
0.107
0.098
0.069
0.143
0.128
0.087
ANN
0.190
0.224
0.168
0.159
0.118
0.216
0.194
0.143
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5.0 CLIMATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS Measurements take over a single one-year period can provide a good estimation of the winds and wind energy potential of a site. However, this is a fairly limited period and is only meaningful if we can place the period into a larger climatological context. For Nickel Mountain, one long-term monitoring site was found. The NWS has maintained a station at Sexton Summit since 1931. Data from this site have been obtained and used to evaluate how this annual study period corresponds to a longer term period. Sexton Summit was chosen for several reasons. It has a similar elevation to Nickel Mountain (3832’), is in the same general part of the state and is in similar terrain. The winds are expected to have at least some relationship to those at Nickel Mountain. Wind data was obtained for the period 1982 to 1997 and for the current study period. Information about the site and the monthly means and departures for this annual study period can be found in Table 5.1. First, the winds overall are less than those observed at Nickel Mountain. This is likely due, at least in part, to the difference in tower heights. Sexton Summit does show a similar seasonal pattern with stronger winds during the winter months and weaker winds in the summer. For this annual period, six of the months have negative departures above 10% with a maximum of -23.9% in May. The departure for the annual period was -5.6%. The high negative departures for October (14.3%), March (-11.1%) and May (-23.9%) are significant and suggest that higher winds might be expected on average during the transition months. This also suggests that the transition months might possess a great deal more variability from year to year, a factor which should be taken into account when estimating the economic feasibility of the site. Most of the power will be produced during the winter months and the transition months essentially extend this period. Using the departures computed for Sexton Summit, it is possible to compute an adjustment factor that can be used to estimate the long-term mean at the present site. This can be done by taking the ratio of the long-term mean and the mean during the current observation period (September 2003 to August 2004). For Sexton Summit this adjustment factor comes out to be 1.066. If this is applied to Nickel Mountain, it indicates the long-term annual mean would be 12.4 mph.
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Table 5.1: Monthly mean and departures for winds at Sexton Summit. SEXTON SUMMIT NWS Lat: 42.60N Lon:123.37W Month
Elev: 3832'
Normal (mph)
Mean (mph)
Departure
1982-1997
current
(%)
Sept
8.6
7.5
-12.8
Oct
9.1
7.8
-14.3
Nov
10.8
10.9
0.9
Dec
11.6
13.1
12.9
Jan
11.7
10.3
-12.0
Feb
10.9
11.4
4.6
Mar
9.9
8.8
-11.1
Apr
8.1
9.0
11.1
May
8.8
6.7
-23.9
Jun
8.7
7.6
-12.6
Jul
9.0
8.3
-7.8
Aug
8.6
7.9
-8.1
ANN
9.7
9.1
-5.6
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6.0 SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION There are a number of factors that might have an influence on the interpretation of the winds observed over this annual study period at Nickel Mountain. First, measurements were taken from only one tower and it is possible that other locations on the mountain might provide better exposure to the prevailing winds. The location of the tower was dictated in part by the terrain and accessibility issues and was placed along the northwest side of the mountain. Although care was taken to locate a location with good exposure to all directions, some blocking of the winds from the south and especially southeast is possible. While this is not expected to be a significant factor, the strongest winds do come from this direction. In any case, the site is ideally situated to capture the flows from the northerly direction. A second factor that is important to consider is that observation were collected at only one height. Flow over an isolated mountain, such as Nickel Mountain, can be very complex and difficult to estimate. These types of flows are influenced by many factors including the density of the air, the exact shape of the mountain and the upper air wind characteristics. Observations taken at a different height above ground would most likely show some differences that might be important to a determination of economic feasibility. In summary, 1) 2) 3) 4)
5)
No problems were encountered during the annual data collection period. Several periods of prolonged icing were detected and removed from the records. The observed annual mean wind speed was 11.6 mph. Nickel Mountain appears to have a good winter resource with most of the strong winds coming from a southerly direction. The winds during the summer are generally weak and energy producing winds are limited to a few hours during the afternoons when the diurnal cycle is strong. These winds are predominantly from the north. A comparison with a nearby site where a longer history of observations are available suggests that this study period (September 2003-August 2004) was approximately 5.6% below normal and that higher winds might be expected during some of the spring and fall transition months. The strongest winds come from a direction that is not completely perpendicular to the mountain but crosses the mountain ridgeline at an angle. This could have an impact on the spacing of turbines and enable more turbines to be used.
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Appendix A: Topographic Map of Nickel Mountain.
Topographic map of Nickel Mountain.
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Appendix B: Photograph of the Nickel Mountain tower looking southwest.
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Appendix C: Site Visit Records and wind gust during period prior to visit. Changes Made Date: 8/18/2003 9/4/2003 10/3/2003 11/3/2003 12/6/2003 1/10/2004 2/5/2004 3/7/2004 4/5/2004 5/3/2004 6/5/2004 7/7/2004 8/4/2004 9/2/2004 10/5/2004
Plug Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
Battery
Time
Y
Y
Gust (mph) 38 38 44 55 54 73 59 56 59 36 38 32 42 35
Comment Site Installed
Guys tightened and tower straightened
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Appendix D: Miscellaneous analysis Tables.
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION WITH NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004 NORMALIZATION PERIOD - ONE YEAR AVERAGE WIND SPEED FOR PERIOD: 11.7 MPH NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY: 1401.7 KWH/M**2/YEAR TOTAL HOURS OBSERVED: 8295 NORMALIZED NORMALIZED SPD HOURS/ AVAIL. ENERGY MPH PERIOD RELFREQ 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42
51 79 231 312 384 432 491 512 490 450 462 499 481 472 477 374 367 280 249 236 197 148 127 87 65 68 60 47 36 32 23 13 19 7 8 10 8 7 1 1 1 0 0
0.61 0.95 2.78 3.76 4.63 5.21 5.92 6.17 5.91 5.42 5.57 6.02 5.80 5.69 5.75 4.51 4.42 3.38 3.00 2.85 2.37 1.78 1.53 1.05 0.78 0.82 0.72 0.57 0.43 0.39 0.28 0.16 0.23 0.08 0.10 0.12 0.10 0.08 0.01 0.01 0.01 0.00 0.00
AVAIL. ENERGY CUMHRS 8295 8244 8165 7934 7622 7238 6806 6315 5803 5313 4863 4401 3902 3421 2949 2472 2098 1731 1451 1202 966 769 621 494 407 342 274 214 167 131 99 76 63 44 37 29 19 11 4 3 2 1 1
CUMRELFREQ
KWH/M**2/YEAR
100.00 99.39 98.43 95.65 91.89 87.26 82.05 76.13 69.96 64.05 58.63 53.06 47.04 41.24 35.55 29.80 25.29 20.87 17.49 14.49 11.65 9.27 7.49 5.96 4.91 4.12 3.30 2.58 2.01 1.58 1.19 0.92 0.76 0.53 0.45 0.35 0.23 0.13 0.05 0.04 0.02 0.01 0.01
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
0.0 0.0 0.1 0.4 1.3 2.8 5.5 9.1 13.0 17.1 24.0 34.5 43.2 53.9 68.1 65.7 78.2 71.5 75.5 84.2 82.0 71.3 70.3 55.1 46.7 55.3 54.8 48.1 41.1 40.6 32.3 20.1 32.4 13.1 16.4 22.3 19.4 18.4 2.9 3.1 3.3 0.0 0.0
20
STATION - NICKEL MTN MONTHLY WIND SPEEDS (MPH) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 -
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
8/2004
AUG
SEP
OCT
NOV
DEC
# OBS
AVG
2003 #OBS
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
9.2 720
11.3 744
14.2 628
17.4 567
2659
12.74
2004 #OBS
15.9 531
14.5 689
10.8 744
10.9 720
9.1 744
9.7 720
9.7 744
10.1 744
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
5636
11.14
AVG
15.9
14.5
10.8
10.9
9.1
9.7
9.7
10.1
9.2
11.3
14.2
17.4
8295
11.65
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
21
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
22
17.0 14.9 11.1 10.5 7.2 8.2 7.8 8.9 9.1 13.3 14.8 16.9
16.5 15.3 10.8 10.7 7.9 7.8 8.2 9.2 9.4 12.9 15.4 16.9
16.9 15.2 11.3 10.8 7.3 7.7 7.7 9.3 9.3 11.9 16.5 16.6
600 16.1 15.1 10.8 10.5 6.9 7.1 6.8 8.5 8.9 11.1 16.1 17.1
700 15.7 15.0 10.1 10.0 6.4 6.3 5.7 7.5 8.3 10.5 15.3 18.0
800 16.4 14.6 9.9 9.3 6.4 6.1 5.7 6.6 7.2 10.2 15.0 18.2 9.9
16.2 14.6 9.1 9.0 6.6 6.2 6.1 6.1 6.3 10.2 14.9 18.4
15.7 13.9 9.4 9.7 8.2 7.7 7.6 6.8 5.8 9.5 14.2 17.2
15.0 13.4 10.5 10.4 9.3 9.6 9.9 9.1 6.3 9.4 13.7 16.8
13.5 12.2 10.7 10.9 10.4 12.0 12.2 11.5 8.0 9.9 13.0 16.4
14.0 12.3 10.7 11.7 12.2 13.3 13.9 13.7 10.5 10.1 12.7 16.6
14.4 13.2 11.5 12.4 13.3 13.5 15.3 14.8 12.3 10.8 11.6 16.2
14.3 13.4 11.4 13.4 14.0 13.9 15.4 15.3 12.8 11.8 12.0 17.3
14.7 14.3 12.0 13.1 13.7 13.8 15.0 15.4 12.1 12.7 12.6 17.4
15.4 15.4 11.9 12.7 12.5 13.6 13.6 13.2 12.1 12.2 12.5 17.7
15.3 15.0 11.1 12.0 11.3 12.6 11.9 11.8 11.5 11.6 13.5 18.4
15.5 15.1 11.5 10.8 10.1 11.4 11.2 11.5 10.2 11.2 14.1 17.9
16.9 15.6 11.0 10.6 9.5 10.7 10.8 10.8 9.3 11.7 14.0 18.3
17.8 15.4 10.9 10.6 8.1 9.9 10.0 9.9 9.2 12.1 14.8 17.7
17.7 15.5 10.9 10.5 7.7 9.2 9.0 9.4 9.0 12.3 14.5 17.6
9.9 10.2 10.9 11.6 12.5 13.2 13.7 13.8 13.4 12.8 12.3 12.2 11.9 11.6
16.3 14.1 9.1 9.3 7.6 6.7 6.2 6.1 5.8 10.1 15.2 18.0
900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900 2000 2100 2200 2300 2400
11.4 11.3 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.4 10.9 10.3 10.0
16.5 14.7 11.0 10.7 7.4 8.4 7.7 8.9 9.1 12.7 15.5 17.0
500
AVG SPD
16.5 14.5 11.5 10.6 7.3 8.6 7.5 8.7 9.1 11.9 15.7 17.7
400
16.7 15.0 11.4 10.2 7.1 8.5 8.1 9.1 9.2 11.6 15.0 18.4
300
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
200
100
8/2004
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN DIURNAL WIND SPEEDS (MPH) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 -
11.7
15.9 14.5 10.8 10.9 9.1 9.7 9.7 10.1 9.2 11.3 14.2 17.4
AVG SPD
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
23
NOTE:
N NNE NE ENE E ESE SE SSE S SSW SW WSW W WNW NW NNW CALM TOTAL %
DIR
19 TO 22
2.8
0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.7 1.2 0.3 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.0
22 TO 25
1.9
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.6 0.9 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
25 TO 28
0.9
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.4 0.3 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
28 TO 31
0.5
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
31 TO 34
0.3
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
34 TO 37
0.1
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
37 TO 40
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
40 TO 43
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
43 TO 46
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
46 TO 49
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
49 TO 52
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
52 TO 55
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
>= 55
100.0
15.8 9.8 3.7 2.4 3.4 2.8 5.2 8.8 13.3 6.0 3.1 2.1 3.7 5.3 6.0 7.7 0.6
TOTAL %
11.7
10.8 8.5 8.3 7.0 6.8 8.3 14.1 16.4 16.3 15.0 10.8 8.7 9.5 11.3 11.0 10.0
MEAN SPEED (MPH)
MEAN SPEED OF THE TOTAL IN A WIND ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. WIND ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
6.4
16 TO 19
44.3 17.5 15.3 10.0
2.7 1.2 0.5 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.9 1.6 2.1 1.0 0.5 0.2 0.5 0.9 1.1 1.4
13 TO 16 0.9 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.8 1.0 1.9 0.9 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.3 0.2 0.1
3.1 2.2 0.7 0.4 0.6 0.3 0.7 1.1 1.4 0.9 0.7 0.4 0.6 1.1 1.4 1.8
10 TO 13 1.6 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.9 1.3 1.9 1.2 0.3 0.1 0.3 0.7 0.8 0.7
7.3 6.4 2.4 1.8 2.7 2.0 1.5 1.7 3.1 1.4 1.4 1.3 2.2 2.2 2.5 3.7
0 TO 10
SPEED CATEGORIES(MPH)
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND ROSE FOR ALL DATA 8295 OBSERVATIONS DATA PERIOD OF RECORD - 9/2003 - 8/2004
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
24
70.8
TOT
41.1
0.0 1.0 1.8 4.0 1.6 4.0 7.3 7.8 7.8 5.1 0.8 0.0
NNE
16.9
0.0 0.4 0.7 2.0 0.1 0.8 1.3 1.8 4.7 4.5 0.6 0.0
NE
7.8
0.0 0.0 0.6 1.8 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 2.3 1.9 0.1 0.0
ENE
9.1
0.1 0.6 0.8 1.5 0.0 1.3 0.2 0.8 0.6 2.6 0.6 0.0
E
16.1
1.4 2.1 0.8 1.4 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.0 1.1 5.0 3.8 0.2
ESE
127.2
33.0 37.1 3.8 1.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.1 0.8 20.3 28.6
SE
317.3
101.4 65.1 16.2 14.0 0.5 0.0 0.2 0.0 2.4 3.0 28.4 86.0
SSE
453.3
73.9 74.0 28.4 26.6 2.6 1.4 0.3 5.1 3.2 47.7 76.3 113.9
S
153.8
29.5 12.3 8.8 11.9 2.8 1.3 0.4 3.3 1.1 13.8 23.5 45.2
SSW 6.6 2.5 6.6 3.2 1.0 0.5 0.1 2.5 0.5 2.2 4.0 3.2 32.9
SW 0.3 0.6 2.2 2.2 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.5 0.6 1.2 1.8 1.2 11.4
WSW
W
27.2
3.1 1.1 2.3 1.4 3.8 1.2 0.2 2.3 0.8 1.2 8.8 1.1 58.1
1.0 2.3 7.3 2.2 18.3 6.0 0.5 4.0 3.3 5.7 5.7 1.7
WNW
58.2
4.6 0.7 3.8 4.9 11.0 5.4 4.7 9.6 4.0 4.9 3.0 1.7
NW
56.6
OBS.
1457.7
255.6 201.1 90.8 87.8 55.5 47.1 51.6 57.9 44.1 105.0 178.4 282.9
TOTAL
0.0 0.8 2.5 3.6 8.4 7.0 17.1 9.8 4.2 2.6 0.6 0.0
NNW
AVAILABLE ENERGY IN AN ENERGY ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. ENERGY ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
0.0 0.7 4.2 5.4 4.7 17.6 18.7 10.1 6.3 2.9 0.1 0.0
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
NOTE:
N
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN. ENERGY ROSE (TOTALS ARE NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY (KWH/M**2) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
7830
526 662 695 683 700 640 665 674 673 719 626 567
NORM.
8760
744 672 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 720 744
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
25
0.2 2.2 8.6 11.1 8.2 13.3 18.8 18.1 20.7 12.4 2.2 0.2
9.9
0.2 5.4 12.9 15.6 15.7 34.4 32.8 24.5 17.6 10.3 0.3 0.2
11.4
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC TOTAL %
9.3 10.9
6.5 14.6
2003 2004
NNE
N
PERIOD
3.8
0.9 1.3 2.8 3.5 1.2 5.8 6.3 5.8 8.6 5.9 1.3 0.0
4.3 3.7
NE
2.5
0.9 0.6 1.7 4.3 2.3 1.5 3.9 2.8 6.1 3.4 0.8 0.2
2.9 2.4
ENE
3.5
0.9 4.1 4.4 4.4 3.0 3.1 2.8 2.6 4.0 7.8 2.5 0.4
4.0 3.4
E
2.9
2.3 4.6 3.8 3.5 2.6 0.6 1.9 0.7 4.4 4.7 4.9 0.5
3.9 2.6
ESE
5.3
11.1 13.8 4.0 5.0 1.3 1.0 0.9 0.3 1.9 2.4 13.2 13.4
7.3 4.6
SE
8.8
28.6 20.6 8.7 7.8 2.0 1.0 1.5 0.3 3.5 3.2 11.9 27.3
10.7 8.5
SSE
13.3
23.7 24.5 10.8 15.1 5.1 2.5 2.0 3.2 5.0 18.5 25.5 33.2
20.1 10.9
S
6.0
17.3 7.1 5.1 6.3 3.4 1.7 1.2 2.8 2.4 6.7 9.7 14.5
8.1 5.5
SSW
3.1
4.3 3.2 5.8 2.1 3.4 1.2 0.7 3.9 2.6 3.2 3.8 3.4
3.3 3.2
SW
2.2
2.1 0.9 3.4 1.9 2.7 2.5 0.3 1.5 3.1 2.6 3.3 1.9
2.8 2.0
WSW
DIRECTION CATEGORIES
DISTRIBUTIONS IN PERCENT
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND DIRECTION FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
3.8
2.3 3.3 6.6 2.5 6.7 3.2 0.8 4.6 3.2 3.6 6.5 1.4
3.8 4.0
W
5.3
0.8 3.3 8.5 3.3 13.6 6.1 1.7 4.2 4.2 6.3 8.1 2.1
5.4 5.7
WNW
6.1
3.6 1.3 6.6 6.0 14.5 9.6 5.1 10.3 4.7 5.0 1.9 1.2
3.5 7.8
NW
7.8
0.8 3.8 6.3 7.6 14.4 12.5 19.2 14.5 7.9 3.9 3.8 0.2
4.1 10.2
NNW
4.6
0.2 2.5 5.1 3.6 4.4 9.7 9.7 8.5 6.0 1.7 0.3 0.0
2.2 5.7
CALM
8295
531 689 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 628 567
2659 5636
TOTAL OBS
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
26
70.8
TOT
41.1
0.0 1.0 1.8 4.0 1.6 4.0 7.3 7.8 7.8 5.1 0.8 0.0
NNE
16.9
0.0 0.4 0.7 2.0 0.1 0.8 1.3 1.8 4.7 4.5 0.6 0.0
NE
7.8
0.0 0.0 0.6 1.8 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 2.3 1.9 0.1 0.0
ENE
9.1
0.1 0.6 0.8 1.5 0.0 1.3 0.2 0.8 0.6 2.6 0.6 0.0
E
16.1
1.4 2.1 0.8 1.4 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.0 1.1 5.0 3.8 0.2
ESE
127.2
33.0 37.1 3.8 1.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.1 0.8 20.3 28.6
SE
317.3
101.4 65.1 16.2 14.0 0.5 0.0 0.2 0.0 2.4 3.0 28.4 86.0
SSE
453.3
73.9 74.0 28.4 26.6 2.6 1.4 0.3 5.1 3.2 47.7 76.3 113.9
S
153.8
29.5 12.3 8.8 11.9 2.8 1.3 0.4 3.3 1.1 13.8 23.5 45.2
SSW 6.6 2.5 6.6 3.2 1.0 0.5 0.1 2.5 0.5 2.2 4.0 3.2 32.9
SW 0.3 0.6 2.2 2.2 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.5 0.6 1.2 1.8 1.2 11.4
WSW
W
27.2
3.1 1.1 2.3 1.4 3.8 1.2 0.2 2.3 0.8 1.2 8.8 1.1 58.1
1.0 2.3 7.3 2.2 18.3 6.0 0.5 4.0 3.3 5.7 5.7 1.7
WNW
58.2
4.6 0.7 3.8 4.9 11.0 5.4 4.7 9.6 4.0 4.9 3.0 1.7
NW
56.6
OBS.
1457.7
255.6 201.1 90.8 87.8 55.5 47.1 51.6 57.9 44.1 105.0 178.4 282.9
TOTAL
0.0 0.8 2.5 3.6 8.4 7.0 17.1 9.8 4.2 2.6 0.6 0.0
NNW
AVAILABLE ENERGY IN AN ENERGY ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. ENERGY ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
0.0 0.7 4.2 5.4 4.7 17.6 18.7 10.1 6.3 2.9 0.1 0.0
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
NOTE:
N
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN. ENERGY ROSE (TOTALS ARE NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY (KWH/M**2) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
7830
526 662 695 683 700 640 665 674 673 719 626 567
NORM.
8760
744 672 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 720 744
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Prepared By:
Energy Resources Research laboratory Oregon State University
November 20, 2004
NOTICE This publication was prepared as an account of work sponsored by the Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. Neither the Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. nor any of their contractors, subcontractors, or their employees make any warranty, express or implied, or assume any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, usefulness, or reliability of the research data, and conclusions reported herein, or of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. For these reasons and for the reason that the views, opinions, and conclusions contained in this material are those of the contractor.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
ii
OREGON ANEMOMETER LOAN PROGRAM
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Prepared by: Philip L. Barbour Stel N. Walker, Ph.D. Energy Resources Research Laboratory Department of Mechanical Engineering Oregon State University Corvallis, OR 97331
Sponsor: Energy Trust of Oregon, Inc. 733 SW Oak Street, Suite 200 Portland Oregon,97205
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
iii
1.0
INTRODUCTION
The Oregon anemometer loan program was established in the fall of 2002 in order to assist landowners in the state evaluate the wind energy potential of their property. The program is funded by a grant from the Energy Trust of Oregon and is administered by the Energy Resources Research Laboratory at Oregon State University. The program involves several steps, beginning with a preliminary evaluation of the site. If estimates of the site show promise then a monitoring system is installed for a fixed duration (typically on year). The site is monitored regularly and the data processed and checked at regular intervals. Upon completion of the first year, the collected wind data is summarized and a report is prepared evaluating the wind data and the wind resource of the location. This report represents the final portion of the project and is designed to give the landowner the information necessary to make an informed choice about the role wind energy might play in their property. The report is separated in to sections with section 2.0 devoted to a description of the site, its location and the type of terrain found there. Section 3.0 includes a summary of the wind data collected during the study period including data quality checks and a characterization of the measured winds. In section 4.0 the wind data is analyzed to determine the amount of power production that might be expected from the site and to examine characteristics that might influence these estimates. This is followed in section 5.0 in which wind data from a nearby site is summarized and used to place the current study period in climatological context. A discussion and summary is then presented in section 6.0
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
1
2.0
SITE DESCRIPTION Site Name: Latitude: Longitude: Elevation: County: Sensor Height: Types of Sensors: Types of Data: Installation Date: Removal Date:
Nickel Mountain 42-58-07 123-26-14 3500 ft. Douglas 67 ft. NRG Maximum #40 wind speed NRG 200 series2 wind vane 10 min. average wind speed (mph) 10 min. std. dev. wind speed (mph) 10 min. wind direction (16 categories) August 18, 2003 @ 1510 PST Current
Site Location: Nickel Mountain is located in south-western Oregon, approximately 25 miles south of Roseburg and about four mile west of the town of Riddle. Access to the site is monitored and is located off the main road heading west from Riddle. The tower is located on the top of the mountain in a location marked on the map included in Appendix A. Site Description: Nickel Mountain resembles a tall but short ridgeline with an orientation from southwest to northeast. The highest point on the mountain is about 3527 feet which is about 2500 feet above the lower valley to the south. Other peaks of greater and lesser height can be seen to the south and west but at some distance away. The top of the mountain was the location of an open pit mining operation and consists of various pits surrounded by mounds and hills. Several roads circle the area. The surface is nearly all rocky shale with only a few trees present. The tower was placed on the northwest side of the mountain on a relatively flat area where it was believed would have good exposure to winds from all but the southeast. A picture of the tower and the top of the mountain has been included in Appendix B. Project Description: The owner of the site is interested in evaluating the site for possible installation of a small wind project. The area at the top of the mountain is somewhat limited but could allow for a small project depending on required spacing of turbines. The mountain top is not currently used for any other activities. At the base of the mountain there are retired industrial buildings associated with the prior use as a mine. It is assumed there is a substation nearby that might be of use.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
2
3.0
WIND CHARACTERISTICS
In the following sections, several characteristics of the winds at Nickel Mountain are examined and discussed. The goals are to evaluate the characteristics that can help explain the physical processes at work at the site and to highlight the properties that are important to assessing the wind energy potential. These evaluations are done using hourly averaged means that have been constructed using the 10 minute means recorded at the site. This is done so that existing analysis programs can be used and is not expected to have any appreciable influence on the interpretation of data. Data Recovery: The amount of data recovered during an observation period is important to characterize and should be examined to determine the confidence of other characteristics. During the initial annual period at this site, there were no problems detected that might influence the collected wind data. A table of site visits and the actions taken has been included in Appendix A. Data were plotted and scanned manually to identify any problems with the site. For the most part, data collection from the site was complete and there were no periods of missing data. However, data for several periods were removed from the records because the effects of icing were detected. This was only done for periods with a clear presence of icing and it is possible that other periods with a more limited influence occurred. Icing is identified as prolonged periods with a wind speed of 0.0 mph and a constant direction. For Nickel Mountain icing was confined to the months between December and January but was significant with nearly 30 % of data removed during December and January.
Recovery Rate (%)
10 0
80
60 40
20
0 Sep
Oct
N o v D ec
Jan
F eb
M ar A p r M ay
Jun
Jul
A ug
A nn
Figure 3.1: Data recovery by month for Nickel Mountain.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
3
Month
Sep
Oct
10 0
Rec. (%)
Nov
Dec
Jan
Feb
8 7
7 6
7 1
9 9
10 0
Mar
Apr
10 0
May
10 0
10 0
Jun 10 0
Jul 10 0
Aug 10 0
Ann 94. 4
Monthly Means: Monthly means are often constructed and used to determine the overall strength of the winds during different periods of the year. Monthly means show that Nickel Mountain is characterized by much stronger winds during the winter months. Somewhat surprising is the relatively low winds during the summer and during both the spring and summer transition periods. The initial evaluation of this site was based in part on observations recorded at Prairie Mountain which had shown some significant winds during these other periods as well as during the winter months. One possible explanation is that this site does not have the same wind characteristics as Prairie Mountain. Another explanation is that the period monitored here was not a typical period. This latter explanation will be examined in a later section.
Monthly Means 20
(mph)
15
10
5
0 Sep
Oct
N o v D ec
Jan
F eb
M ar A p r M ay
Jun
Jul
A ug
May
Jun
A nn
Figure 3.2: Monthly Mean Wind Speed Values for Nickel Mountain.
Month Mean (mph)
Sep 9.2
Oct 11.3
Nov 14.2
Dec 17.4
Jan 15.9
Feb 14.5
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
Mar 10.8
Apr 10.9
9.1
9.7
Jul 9.7
Aug
Ann
10.1
11.7
4
Diurnal Means: The diurnal pattern of winds is an important characteristic for many wind sites and helps illuminate the mechanisms responsible for the winds. In general, a diurnal pattern is associated with a site at which strong thermal influences play a role. These are normally accentuated during the summer months when the daily heating cycle is at its greatest. Diurnal variations can also provide an indication of dependable and predictable winds at a site. For Nickel Mountain it is clear that a diurnal pattern is present during the summer months and is strong enough to show up in the mean for the annual diurnal average (Fig. 3.3). In general, the diurnal values for summer show that the winds are very light through the night and morning hours and begin to pick up around noon. The magnitude of the winds build until around 1700-1800 and taper off slowly. On average, the winds during these days are in a usable range for about 25% of the time. The winds during these periods are predominantly from the north and are a response to large-scale heating patterns. As expected, during the winter months there is little indication of a diurnal variation. In fact, the diurnal figure shows almost an inverse of this during January with lighter winds during the late afternoon hours. This is not a common pattern and may be a consequence of atmospheric stability or possibly the result of some missing data. Diurnal Mean Winds 20 18
Wind Speed (mph)
16 14 12
AVE
10
Jan Jul
8 6 4 2 0 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Hour of Day
Figure 3.3: Diurnal mean wind speed values for Nickel Mountain.
Frequency Distribution: How the wind speed at a site is distributed over various wind speed categories is an important indication of the wind resource potential of a site. An ideal site would have winds that blow at a high rate for long periods. This is not normally the case, however, and wind records from a site show a skewed distribution with a higher frequency of winds at lower speeds. Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
5
For Nickel Mountain (Figure 3.4) we see that the distribution is fairly typical with a low frequency of winds at the lowest range, a peak centered around 10.0 mph and a trailing tail at the upper end. In this case the peak is relatively broad or resembles a double peak structure that illustrates that it is most common to have winds in the range of 5-15 mph. This peak would likely be smoother with additional data. Over 60 % of the time the wind is within this range. The upper end is relatively low and the highest wind value observed was 44 mph. This is relatively low for a good wind site and suggests that there is a low frequency of winds at the upper end of the range. This is significant because it is at higher wind speeds where most of the potential power is produced. Relative Frequency 10 9
Frequency (%)
8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Wind Speed Category
Figure 3.4: Wind speed frequency distribution for Nickel Mountain.
Wind Rose: How the wind varies with direction is also important to understanding the physical processes that contribute to the local winds at a site and eventually in designing a wind facility. A wind rose is often used to display this information and show the frequency with which the wind occurs in different direction categories. A similar plot can be used to show the strength of the wind from each of the direction categories. For this site (Figure 3.5) it is apparent that the winds come from two general directions, the north and the south (grouping together categories). The categories show about equal frequencies with smaller values at some of the other directions. Viewing the second figure we see that the mean wind speeds for the southerly directions are much higher than for the northerly directions. This is often the case at sites in the Northwest where southerly winds associated with strong storm systems during the winter months produce much of the observed wind. The higher wind speed averages for the southerly directions
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
6
18
18
16
16
14
14
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
suggest that this is the direction from which a majority of the energy producing winds will come from.
12 10 8 6 4 2
12 10 8 6 4 2
0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
CA LM
Direction Category
N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C ALM
Direction Category
Figure 3.5: Frequency (%) and average wind speed (mph) for each of 16 wind direction categories
In order understand better the winds at the site during different times of year; similar plots have been constructed using data from the individual months of January and July. These can be seen in figures 3.6a-d and show the dramatic difference between the two periods. For January, strong winds are present in the most frequent categories (SE, SSE, S and SSW). These four categories together account for over 80 % of the cases and for each of these, the mean wind is grater than 15.0 mph. For July, nearly 80 % of the cases are also confined to four conjoining categories. This time they are northerly (NNE, N, NNW and NW) but the mean winds for these categories are much lower. Overall this suggests that a large majority of the energy producing winds will occur in the winter when the winds are from a general southerly direction.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
7
January
January 25
40
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
35 30 25 20 15 10
20
15
10
5
5 0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
N
C A LM
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C A LM
Direction Category
Direction Category
July
July 25
40
Mean Speed (mph)
Frequency (%)
35 30 25 20 15 10
20
15
10
5
5 0
0 N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
C A LM
Direction Category
N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
Direction Category
Figure 3.6: Frequency (%) and average wind speed (mph) for each of 16 wind direction categories for the months of January and July at Nickel Mountain.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
8
4.0
SITE POWER CHARACTERISTICS
In order to evaluate the wind power potential at this site a number of quantities were computed using the collected wind data. As with the wind characteristics, hourly wind data was used to complete this work. The power density calculation requires air density. This is estimated assuming a standard atmosphere and the site elevation. The computed quantities include the mean and standard deviation of the hourly values, the recovery rate, the maximum one hour average, the wind power density and the frequency that the wind was observed within a wind speed range (12 mph to 60 mph). These quantities are shown in Table 4.1 and reveal a number of things about the potential for generating energy the site. First, the quantities in Table 4.1 illustrate the strong seasonal nature of the wind at this site and suggest that much of the energy potential can be found in the months between November and February. During these months nearly all of the quantities in Table 4.1 are higher, especially during December when the Mean speed was 17.4 mph and the winds were within the general operating range of a typical wind turbine (12.0 mph to 60.0 mph) about 80% of the time. Some care should be taken when interpreting this, however. A number of periods in each of these months showed the influence of icing and some data were removed. It is impossible to judge what the winds were like during these periods. To examine the overall amount of energy contained in the wind, the power density is very useful. It represents the amount of energy that would be available to a unit area each hour. The monthly mean values are shown in figure 4.1 and highlight the seasonal amount of available energy and shows how quickly the resource picks up and drops off during the transition months. For example, the power density during March is less than half that for February. Overall, the months range between 71 W/m**2 and 379 W/M**2.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
9
Table 4.1: Observed and computed power quantities for the wind site at Nickel Mountain. Month
Mean speed
Std.
Recovery
Max 1-Hr
Time in Range
Power Den.
Shape
Scale
(mph)
(mph)
Rate (%)
(mph)
12-60 mph(%)
W/m**2
Factor
Factor
Sept
9.2
4.7
100.0
25.1
27.9
71
2.09
10.4
Oct
11.3
6.0
100.0
30.4
43.1
137
1.99
12.8
Nov
14.2
6.8
87.2
33.0
59.2
246
2.23
16.1
Dec
17.4
6.6
76.2
37.5
80.2
379
2.87
19.6
Jan
15.9
7.6
71.4
43.9
67.8
340
2.24
17.9
Feb
14.5
7.8
99.0
39.8
59.5
288
1.95
16.3
Mar
10.8
5.7
100.0
36.7
36.4
124
1.99
12.2
Apr
10.9
5.8
100.0
36.9
39.0
123
1.99
12.2
May
9.1
5.2
100.0
23.6
32.0
77
1.82
10.2
Jun
9.7
4.9
100.0
26.0
30.8
81
2.10
10.9
Jul
9.7
4.9
100.0
23.1
35.2
82
2.09
11.0
Aug
10.1
5.0
100.0
26.0
36.7
89
2.14
11.4
ANN
11.7
6.5
94.7
43.9
44.2
160
1.89
13.1
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
10
Nickel Mountain 400
Power Density (W/m**2)
350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 Sept
Oct
Nov
Dec
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
ANN
Figure 4.1: Monthly power density for Nickel Mountain.
In addition to evaluating these basic power characteristics it is possible to estimate how specific wind turbines might interact with the winds at a particular site. Using the collected wind data and the characteristics of a particular wind turbine it is possible to estimate the amount of power it could produce. This is done by comparing the wind data with a power curve for a specific wind turbine. A power curve is simply the curve that shows the relationship between the wind speed and the amount of power a turbine can produce. An example is provided in Figure 4.2. There are several portions of the curve that are important. At low wind speeds, below the cut-in speed, no energy is produced. Any turbine has a lower threshold below which it won’t operate. This is in part because there is little energy available at these levels. In the middle is a ramp up zone where even a small increase in wind speed results in a larger increase in power. At some point, depending on the type of turbine, the amount of power hits its rated capacity as the blades are pitched to spill energy and protect the turbine. At the upper end, energy production will stop if the winds reach a cut-out speed. This is the speed at which a turbine is shut down. In Table 4.2, energy capacity factors are shown for eight different types of turbines. The capacity factor is the ratio of the amount of energy produce to the amount of energy that could be produced if a turbine ran at its rated capacity all the time. The rated capacity is effectively a theoretical maximum and capacity factors generally range from 0.0 to 0.40. It’s difficult to compare these because of the different turbine characteristics but they are Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
11
given to provide a range of values that might be expected from this site. In computing these values, it is necessary to adjust the observed data which is measured at 67 feet to the hub height of the particular turbine. In this case this is done using a standard assumption that the wind follows a typical power law profile with a coefficient of 0.143. 120
Power Output (% of Rated)
100
80
60
40
20
0 0
10
20
30
40
50
Wind Speed (mph)
Figure 4.1: Sample power curve for a theoretical turbine
The capacity factors in Table 4.2 support the conclusions of the previous section and indicate that there appears to be a good winter resource available at the site. Capacity values for each of the turbine types are greatest during this period and low during the remaining months. Several turbine types have capacity factors around 0.4 for December. This is considered a good value. However, the higher wind periods are not sustained and the majority of the months have capacity factors closer to about 0.1 or 0.2. This is reflected in the annual capacity factors that are relatively low for each of the turbine types.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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Table 4.2: Capacity factors computed for Nickel Mountain using observed wind data and characteristics of eight different wind turbines. Turbine Size (kW) Hub Ht. (ft.)
Vesta 47
Vestas 80
Vestas 66
Vestas 7.5
BWC EXCEL
GE Wind 70.5
Vestas 29
Mitsubishi
660
2000
1650
55
10
1500
225
250
131
262
197
59
79
210
103
100
Sept
0.094
0.116
0.080
0.073
0.052
0.108
0.097
0.066
Oct
0.177
0.210
0.155
0.145
0.105
0.201
0.180
0.129
Nov
0.286
0.332
0.256
0.246
0.185
0.326
0.291
0.222
Dec
0.413
0.471
0.373
0.361
0.275
0.467
0.419
0.323
Jan
0.352
0.403
0.319
0.310
0.240
0.399
0.360
0.282
Feb
0.314
0.359
0.284
0.273
0.208
0.356
0.319
0.246
Mar
0.148
0.179
0.130
0.122
0.090
0.170
0.153
0.110
Apr
0.157
0.188
0.136
0.128
0.092
0.179
0.160
0.113
May
0.108
0.132
0.092
0.084
0.059
0.123
0.109
0.075
Jun
0.111
0.137
0.096
0.086
0.062
0.128
0.114
0.078
Jul
0.115
0.142
0.098
0.090
0.063
0.132
0.118
0.080
Aug
0.125
0.154
0.107
0.098
0.069
0.143
0.128
0.087
ANN
0.190
0.224
0.168
0.159
0.118
0.216
0.194
0.143
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
13
5.0 CLIMATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS Measurements take over a single one-year period can provide a good estimation of the winds and wind energy potential of a site. However, this is a fairly limited period and is only meaningful if we can place the period into a larger climatological context. For Nickel Mountain, one long-term monitoring site was found. The NWS has maintained a station at Sexton Summit since 1931. Data from this site have been obtained and used to evaluate how this annual study period corresponds to a longer term period. Sexton Summit was chosen for several reasons. It has a similar elevation to Nickel Mountain (3832’), is in the same general part of the state and is in similar terrain. The winds are expected to have at least some relationship to those at Nickel Mountain. Wind data was obtained for the period 1982 to 1997 and for the current study period. Information about the site and the monthly means and departures for this annual study period can be found in Table 5.1. First, the winds overall are less than those observed at Nickel Mountain. This is likely due, at least in part, to the difference in tower heights. Sexton Summit does show a similar seasonal pattern with stronger winds during the winter months and weaker winds in the summer. For this annual period, six of the months have negative departures above 10% with a maximum of -23.9% in May. The departure for the annual period was -5.6%. The high negative departures for October (14.3%), March (-11.1%) and May (-23.9%) are significant and suggest that higher winds might be expected on average during the transition months. This also suggests that the transition months might possess a great deal more variability from year to year, a factor which should be taken into account when estimating the economic feasibility of the site. Most of the power will be produced during the winter months and the transition months essentially extend this period. Using the departures computed for Sexton Summit, it is possible to compute an adjustment factor that can be used to estimate the long-term mean at the present site. This can be done by taking the ratio of the long-term mean and the mean during the current observation period (September 2003 to August 2004). For Sexton Summit this adjustment factor comes out to be 1.066. If this is applied to Nickel Mountain, it indicates the long-term annual mean would be 12.4 mph.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
14
Table 5.1: Monthly mean and departures for winds at Sexton Summit. SEXTON SUMMIT NWS Lat: 42.60N Lon:123.37W Month
Elev: 3832'
Normal (mph)
Mean (mph)
Departure
1982-1997
current
(%)
Sept
8.6
7.5
-12.8
Oct
9.1
7.8
-14.3
Nov
10.8
10.9
0.9
Dec
11.6
13.1
12.9
Jan
11.7
10.3
-12.0
Feb
10.9
11.4
4.6
Mar
9.9
8.8
-11.1
Apr
8.1
9.0
11.1
May
8.8
6.7
-23.9
Jun
8.7
7.6
-12.6
Jul
9.0
8.3
-7.8
Aug
8.6
7.9
-8.1
ANN
9.7
9.1
-5.6
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
15
6.0 SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION There are a number of factors that might have an influence on the interpretation of the winds observed over this annual study period at Nickel Mountain. First, measurements were taken from only one tower and it is possible that other locations on the mountain might provide better exposure to the prevailing winds. The location of the tower was dictated in part by the terrain and accessibility issues and was placed along the northwest side of the mountain. Although care was taken to locate a location with good exposure to all directions, some blocking of the winds from the south and especially southeast is possible. While this is not expected to be a significant factor, the strongest winds do come from this direction. In any case, the site is ideally situated to capture the flows from the northerly direction. A second factor that is important to consider is that observation were collected at only one height. Flow over an isolated mountain, such as Nickel Mountain, can be very complex and difficult to estimate. These types of flows are influenced by many factors including the density of the air, the exact shape of the mountain and the upper air wind characteristics. Observations taken at a different height above ground would most likely show some differences that might be important to a determination of economic feasibility. In summary, 1) 2) 3) 4)
5)
No problems were encountered during the annual data collection period. Several periods of prolonged icing were detected and removed from the records. The observed annual mean wind speed was 11.6 mph. Nickel Mountain appears to have a good winter resource with most of the strong winds coming from a southerly direction. The winds during the summer are generally weak and energy producing winds are limited to a few hours during the afternoons when the diurnal cycle is strong. These winds are predominantly from the north. A comparison with a nearby site where a longer history of observations are available suggests that this study period (September 2003-August 2004) was approximately 5.6% below normal and that higher winds might be expected during some of the spring and fall transition months. The strongest winds come from a direction that is not completely perpendicular to the mountain but crosses the mountain ridgeline at an angle. This could have an impact on the spacing of turbines and enable more turbines to be used.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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Appendix A: Topographic Map of Nickel Mountain.
Topographic map of Nickel Mountain.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
17
Appendix B: Photograph of the Nickel Mountain tower looking southwest.
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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Appendix C: Site Visit Records and wind gust during period prior to visit. Changes Made Date: 8/18/2003 9/4/2003 10/3/2003 11/3/2003 12/6/2003 1/10/2004 2/5/2004 3/7/2004 4/5/2004 5/3/2004 6/5/2004 7/7/2004 8/4/2004 9/2/2004 10/5/2004
Plug Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
Battery
Time
Y
Y
Gust (mph) 38 38 44 55 54 73 59 56 59 36 38 32 42 35
Comment Site Installed
Guys tightened and tower straightened
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
19
Appendix D: Miscellaneous analysis Tables.
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION WITH NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004 NORMALIZATION PERIOD - ONE YEAR AVERAGE WIND SPEED FOR PERIOD: 11.7 MPH NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY: 1401.7 KWH/M**2/YEAR TOTAL HOURS OBSERVED: 8295 NORMALIZED NORMALIZED SPD HOURS/ AVAIL. ENERGY MPH PERIOD RELFREQ 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42
51 79 231 312 384 432 491 512 490 450 462 499 481 472 477 374 367 280 249 236 197 148 127 87 65 68 60 47 36 32 23 13 19 7 8 10 8 7 1 1 1 0 0
0.61 0.95 2.78 3.76 4.63 5.21 5.92 6.17 5.91 5.42 5.57 6.02 5.80 5.69 5.75 4.51 4.42 3.38 3.00 2.85 2.37 1.78 1.53 1.05 0.78 0.82 0.72 0.57 0.43 0.39 0.28 0.16 0.23 0.08 0.10 0.12 0.10 0.08 0.01 0.01 0.01 0.00 0.00
AVAIL. ENERGY CUMHRS 8295 8244 8165 7934 7622 7238 6806 6315 5803 5313 4863 4401 3902 3421 2949 2472 2098 1731 1451 1202 966 769 621 494 407 342 274 214 167 131 99 76 63 44 37 29 19 11 4 3 2 1 1
CUMRELFREQ
KWH/M**2/YEAR
100.00 99.39 98.43 95.65 91.89 87.26 82.05 76.13 69.96 64.05 58.63 53.06 47.04 41.24 35.55 29.80 25.29 20.87 17.49 14.49 11.65 9.27 7.49 5.96 4.91 4.12 3.30 2.58 2.01 1.58 1.19 0.92 0.76 0.53 0.45 0.35 0.23 0.13 0.05 0.04 0.02 0.01 0.01
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
0.0 0.0 0.1 0.4 1.3 2.8 5.5 9.1 13.0 17.1 24.0 34.5 43.2 53.9 68.1 65.7 78.2 71.5 75.5 84.2 82.0 71.3 70.3 55.1 46.7 55.3 54.8 48.1 41.1 40.6 32.3 20.1 32.4 13.1 16.4 22.3 19.4 18.4 2.9 3.1 3.3 0.0 0.0
20
STATION - NICKEL MTN MONTHLY WIND SPEEDS (MPH) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 -
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
8/2004
AUG
SEP
OCT
NOV
DEC
# OBS
AVG
2003 #OBS
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
9.2 720
11.3 744
14.2 628
17.4 567
2659
12.74
2004 #OBS
15.9 531
14.5 689
10.8 744
10.9 720
9.1 744
9.7 720
9.7 744
10.1 744
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
0.0 0
5636
11.14
AVG
15.9
14.5
10.8
10.9
9.1
9.7
9.7
10.1
9.2
11.3
14.2
17.4
8295
11.65
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
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Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
22
17.0 14.9 11.1 10.5 7.2 8.2 7.8 8.9 9.1 13.3 14.8 16.9
16.5 15.3 10.8 10.7 7.9 7.8 8.2 9.2 9.4 12.9 15.4 16.9
16.9 15.2 11.3 10.8 7.3 7.7 7.7 9.3 9.3 11.9 16.5 16.6
600 16.1 15.1 10.8 10.5 6.9 7.1 6.8 8.5 8.9 11.1 16.1 17.1
700 15.7 15.0 10.1 10.0 6.4 6.3 5.7 7.5 8.3 10.5 15.3 18.0
800 16.4 14.6 9.9 9.3 6.4 6.1 5.7 6.6 7.2 10.2 15.0 18.2 9.9
16.2 14.6 9.1 9.0 6.6 6.2 6.1 6.1 6.3 10.2 14.9 18.4
15.7 13.9 9.4 9.7 8.2 7.7 7.6 6.8 5.8 9.5 14.2 17.2
15.0 13.4 10.5 10.4 9.3 9.6 9.9 9.1 6.3 9.4 13.7 16.8
13.5 12.2 10.7 10.9 10.4 12.0 12.2 11.5 8.0 9.9 13.0 16.4
14.0 12.3 10.7 11.7 12.2 13.3 13.9 13.7 10.5 10.1 12.7 16.6
14.4 13.2 11.5 12.4 13.3 13.5 15.3 14.8 12.3 10.8 11.6 16.2
14.3 13.4 11.4 13.4 14.0 13.9 15.4 15.3 12.8 11.8 12.0 17.3
14.7 14.3 12.0 13.1 13.7 13.8 15.0 15.4 12.1 12.7 12.6 17.4
15.4 15.4 11.9 12.7 12.5 13.6 13.6 13.2 12.1 12.2 12.5 17.7
15.3 15.0 11.1 12.0 11.3 12.6 11.9 11.8 11.5 11.6 13.5 18.4
15.5 15.1 11.5 10.8 10.1 11.4 11.2 11.5 10.2 11.2 14.1 17.9
16.9 15.6 11.0 10.6 9.5 10.7 10.8 10.8 9.3 11.7 14.0 18.3
17.8 15.4 10.9 10.6 8.1 9.9 10.0 9.9 9.2 12.1 14.8 17.7
17.7 15.5 10.9 10.5 7.7 9.2 9.0 9.4 9.0 12.3 14.5 17.6
9.9 10.2 10.9 11.6 12.5 13.2 13.7 13.8 13.4 12.8 12.3 12.2 11.9 11.6
16.3 14.1 9.1 9.3 7.6 6.7 6.2 6.1 5.8 10.1 15.2 18.0
900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900 2000 2100 2200 2300 2400
11.4 11.3 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.4 10.9 10.3 10.0
16.5 14.7 11.0 10.7 7.4 8.4 7.7 8.9 9.1 12.7 15.5 17.0
500
AVG SPD
16.5 14.5 11.5 10.6 7.3 8.6 7.5 8.7 9.1 11.9 15.7 17.7
400
16.7 15.0 11.4 10.2 7.1 8.5 8.1 9.1 9.2 11.6 15.0 18.4
300
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
200
100
8/2004
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN DIURNAL WIND SPEEDS (MPH) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 -
11.7
15.9 14.5 10.8 10.9 9.1 9.7 9.7 10.1 9.2 11.3 14.2 17.4
AVG SPD
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
23
NOTE:
N NNE NE ENE E ESE SE SSE S SSW SW WSW W WNW NW NNW CALM TOTAL %
DIR
19 TO 22
2.8
0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.7 1.2 0.3 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.0
22 TO 25
1.9
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.6 0.9 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
25 TO 28
0.9
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.4 0.3 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
28 TO 31
0.5
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
31 TO 34
0.3
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
34 TO 37
0.1
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
37 TO 40
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
40 TO 43
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
43 TO 46
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
46 TO 49
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
49 TO 52
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
52 TO 55
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
>= 55
100.0
15.8 9.8 3.7 2.4 3.4 2.8 5.2 8.8 13.3 6.0 3.1 2.1 3.7 5.3 6.0 7.7 0.6
TOTAL %
11.7
10.8 8.5 8.3 7.0 6.8 8.3 14.1 16.4 16.3 15.0 10.8 8.7 9.5 11.3 11.0 10.0
MEAN SPEED (MPH)
MEAN SPEED OF THE TOTAL IN A WIND ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. WIND ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
6.4
16 TO 19
44.3 17.5 15.3 10.0
2.7 1.2 0.5 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.9 1.6 2.1 1.0 0.5 0.2 0.5 0.9 1.1 1.4
13 TO 16 0.9 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.8 1.0 1.9 0.9 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.3 0.2 0.1
3.1 2.2 0.7 0.4 0.6 0.3 0.7 1.1 1.4 0.9 0.7 0.4 0.6 1.1 1.4 1.8
10 TO 13 1.6 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.9 1.3 1.9 1.2 0.3 0.1 0.3 0.7 0.8 0.7
7.3 6.4 2.4 1.8 2.7 2.0 1.5 1.7 3.1 1.4 1.4 1.3 2.2 2.2 2.5 3.7
0 TO 10
SPEED CATEGORIES(MPH)
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND ROSE FOR ALL DATA 8295 OBSERVATIONS DATA PERIOD OF RECORD - 9/2003 - 8/2004
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
24
70.8
TOT
41.1
0.0 1.0 1.8 4.0 1.6 4.0 7.3 7.8 7.8 5.1 0.8 0.0
NNE
16.9
0.0 0.4 0.7 2.0 0.1 0.8 1.3 1.8 4.7 4.5 0.6 0.0
NE
7.8
0.0 0.0 0.6 1.8 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 2.3 1.9 0.1 0.0
ENE
9.1
0.1 0.6 0.8 1.5 0.0 1.3 0.2 0.8 0.6 2.6 0.6 0.0
E
16.1
1.4 2.1 0.8 1.4 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.0 1.1 5.0 3.8 0.2
ESE
127.2
33.0 37.1 3.8 1.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.1 0.8 20.3 28.6
SE
317.3
101.4 65.1 16.2 14.0 0.5 0.0 0.2 0.0 2.4 3.0 28.4 86.0
SSE
453.3
73.9 74.0 28.4 26.6 2.6 1.4 0.3 5.1 3.2 47.7 76.3 113.9
S
153.8
29.5 12.3 8.8 11.9 2.8 1.3 0.4 3.3 1.1 13.8 23.5 45.2
SSW 6.6 2.5 6.6 3.2 1.0 0.5 0.1 2.5 0.5 2.2 4.0 3.2 32.9
SW 0.3 0.6 2.2 2.2 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.5 0.6 1.2 1.8 1.2 11.4
WSW
W
27.2
3.1 1.1 2.3 1.4 3.8 1.2 0.2 2.3 0.8 1.2 8.8 1.1 58.1
1.0 2.3 7.3 2.2 18.3 6.0 0.5 4.0 3.3 5.7 5.7 1.7
WNW
58.2
4.6 0.7 3.8 4.9 11.0 5.4 4.7 9.6 4.0 4.9 3.0 1.7
NW
56.6
OBS.
1457.7
255.6 201.1 90.8 87.8 55.5 47.1 51.6 57.9 44.1 105.0 178.4 282.9
TOTAL
0.0 0.8 2.5 3.6 8.4 7.0 17.1 9.8 4.2 2.6 0.6 0.0
NNW
AVAILABLE ENERGY IN AN ENERGY ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. ENERGY ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
0.0 0.7 4.2 5.4 4.7 17.6 18.7 10.1 6.3 2.9 0.1 0.0
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
NOTE:
N
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN. ENERGY ROSE (TOTALS ARE NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY (KWH/M**2) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
7830
526 662 695 683 700 640 665 674 673 719 626 567
NORM.
8760
744 672 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 720 744
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
25
0.2 2.2 8.6 11.1 8.2 13.3 18.8 18.1 20.7 12.4 2.2 0.2
9.9
0.2 5.4 12.9 15.6 15.7 34.4 32.8 24.5 17.6 10.3 0.3 0.2
11.4
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC TOTAL %
9.3 10.9
6.5 14.6
2003 2004
NNE
N
PERIOD
3.8
0.9 1.3 2.8 3.5 1.2 5.8 6.3 5.8 8.6 5.9 1.3 0.0
4.3 3.7
NE
2.5
0.9 0.6 1.7 4.3 2.3 1.5 3.9 2.8 6.1 3.4 0.8 0.2
2.9 2.4
ENE
3.5
0.9 4.1 4.4 4.4 3.0 3.1 2.8 2.6 4.0 7.8 2.5 0.4
4.0 3.4
E
2.9
2.3 4.6 3.8 3.5 2.6 0.6 1.9 0.7 4.4 4.7 4.9 0.5
3.9 2.6
ESE
5.3
11.1 13.8 4.0 5.0 1.3 1.0 0.9 0.3 1.9 2.4 13.2 13.4
7.3 4.6
SE
8.8
28.6 20.6 8.7 7.8 2.0 1.0 1.5 0.3 3.5 3.2 11.9 27.3
10.7 8.5
SSE
13.3
23.7 24.5 10.8 15.1 5.1 2.5 2.0 3.2 5.0 18.5 25.5 33.2
20.1 10.9
S
6.0
17.3 7.1 5.1 6.3 3.4 1.7 1.2 2.8 2.4 6.7 9.7 14.5
8.1 5.5
SSW
3.1
4.3 3.2 5.8 2.1 3.4 1.2 0.7 3.9 2.6 3.2 3.8 3.4
3.3 3.2
SW
2.2
2.1 0.9 3.4 1.9 2.7 2.5 0.3 1.5 3.1 2.6 3.3 1.9
2.8 2.0
WSW
DIRECTION CATEGORIES
DISTRIBUTIONS IN PERCENT
STATION - NICKEL MTN. WIND DIRECTION FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
3.8
2.3 3.3 6.6 2.5 6.7 3.2 0.8 4.6 3.2 3.6 6.5 1.4
3.8 4.0
W
5.3
0.8 3.3 8.5 3.3 13.6 6.1 1.7 4.2 4.2 6.3 8.1 2.1
5.4 5.7
WNW
6.1
3.6 1.3 6.6 6.0 14.5 9.6 5.1 10.3 4.7 5.0 1.9 1.2
3.5 7.8
NW
7.8
0.8 3.8 6.3 7.6 14.4 12.5 19.2 14.5 7.9 3.9 3.8 0.2
4.1 10.2
NNW
4.6
0.2 2.5 5.1 3.6 4.4 9.7 9.7 8.5 6.0 1.7 0.3 0.0
2.2 5.7
CALM
8295
531 689 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 628 567
2659 5636
TOTAL OBS
Wind Resource Evaluation: Nickel Mountain
26
70.8
TOT
41.1
0.0 1.0 1.8 4.0 1.6 4.0 7.3 7.8 7.8 5.1 0.8 0.0
NNE
16.9
0.0 0.4 0.7 2.0 0.1 0.8 1.3 1.8 4.7 4.5 0.6 0.0
NE
7.8
0.0 0.0 0.6 1.8 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 2.3 1.9 0.1 0.0
ENE
9.1
0.1 0.6 0.8 1.5 0.0 1.3 0.2 0.8 0.6 2.6 0.6 0.0
E
16.1
1.4 2.1 0.8 1.4 0.1 0.0 0.1 0.0 1.1 5.0 3.8 0.2
ESE
127.2
33.0 37.1 3.8 1.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.1 0.8 20.3 28.6
SE
317.3
101.4 65.1 16.2 14.0 0.5 0.0 0.2 0.0 2.4 3.0 28.4 86.0
SSE
453.3
73.9 74.0 28.4 26.6 2.6 1.4 0.3 5.1 3.2 47.7 76.3 113.9
S
153.8
29.5 12.3 8.8 11.9 2.8 1.3 0.4 3.3 1.1 13.8 23.5 45.2
SSW 6.6 2.5 6.6 3.2 1.0 0.5 0.1 2.5 0.5 2.2 4.0 3.2 32.9
SW 0.3 0.6 2.2 2.2 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.5 0.6 1.2 1.8 1.2 11.4
WSW
W
27.2
3.1 1.1 2.3 1.4 3.8 1.2 0.2 2.3 0.8 1.2 8.8 1.1 58.1
1.0 2.3 7.3 2.2 18.3 6.0 0.5 4.0 3.3 5.7 5.7 1.7
WNW
58.2
4.6 0.7 3.8 4.9 11.0 5.4 4.7 9.6 4.0 4.9 3.0 1.7
NW
56.6
OBS.
1457.7
255.6 201.1 90.8 87.8 55.5 47.1 51.6 57.9 44.1 105.0 178.4 282.9
TOTAL
0.0 0.8 2.5 3.6 8.4 7.0 17.1 9.8 4.2 2.6 0.6 0.0
NNW
AVAILABLE ENERGY IN AN ENERGY ROSE MAY DIFFER FROM THE SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION FOR A GIVEN PERIOD DUE TO DATA SELECTION. SPEED FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONS REQUIRE ONLY A WIND SPEED OBSERVATION BE PRESENT. ENERGY ROSES, ON THE OTHER HAND, REQUIRE BOTH SPEED AND DIRECTION BE PRESENT FOR EACH OBSERVATION.
0.0 0.7 4.2 5.4 4.7 17.6 18.7 10.1 6.3 2.9 0.1 0.0
JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
NOTE:
N
MON
STATION - NICKEL MTN. ENERGY ROSE (TOTALS ARE NORMALIZED AVAILABLE ENERGY (KWH/M**2) DATA PERIOD OF RECORD 9/2003 - 8/2004
7830
526 662 695 683 700 640 665 674 673 719 626 567
NORM.
8760
744 672 744 720 744 720 744 744 720 744 720 744
