COLORADO ANEMOMETER LOAN PROGRAM
 

PROGRAM INFORMATION

Frequently Asked Questions
Colorado Wind Resource Maps
ALP Sites and Data
Small Wind Electric Systems: A Colorado Consumer's Guide
Small Wind Applications Guide Video
Professional Anemometry
Donations

APPLICATION INFORMATION

Program Goals
Selection Criteria
Lessee Responsibilities
Site Layout and Anchors
Tower Safety
Data Plug Replacement
Ideal Sites
Online Application
 

WIND TURBINE RESOURCES

Zoning
Equipment Information and Dealers
Financing
Links

ABOUT US

Current Personnel
Student Positions
Contact Us

WELLINGTON - 6/12/2008 through 6/18/2009

LOCATION DETAILS
Latitude:
N 40° 44.624’ or N 40° 44’ 37"
Longitude:
W 104° 58.137’ or W 104° 58’ 8"
Township:
9 N
Range:
68 W
Section:
14
Elevation (ft.):
5,323
Tower Type:
NRG Tilt-Up
Tower Height:
20 m (65.6 ft)
Vane Offset (deg):
+342°
Direction Basis:
Magnetic North
Mag. Declination:
9° 22' E, changing by 8' W/yr
Wind Explorer S/N:
0749
Site No.:
4004

DATA DETAILS

June 12, 2008 through June 18, 2009:

The anemometer tower was installed on June 12, 2008. The site was located about 3 miles northeast of Wellington in a pasture, with higher ground to the east. The wind was thought to funnel through a gap in the mountains about 10 miles east. The lessee's house is locaed just west of where the tower site was..

All data was collected using an NRG #40 Anemometer and NRG #200 Wind Vane mounted on a tilt-up tower located on the landowner's property at a height of 20m. This equipment fed into an NRG Wind Explorer data logger. All data plugs were sent to the Colorado ALP at Colorado State University for analysis. The data plug files and text versions for all files received during the measuring period are given below.

Raw Wind Data Files
NRG Data Plug Files
Txt Files

Highest
2 sec
Gust
mph

Gust
Date/Time
51
6/17/08 14:15
Wellington_4004_2008_0729_0912.A08 Wellington_4004_2008_0729_0912.txt
61
8/1/08 17:12
Wellington_4004_2008_0912_1107.A08 Wellington_4004_2008_0912_1107.txt
68
11/6/08 2:58
Wellington_4004_2008_1107_0117.A08 Wellington_4004_2008_1107_0117.txt
67
1/7/09 14:11
Wellington_4004_2009_0117_0307.A09 Wellington_4004_2009_0117_0307.txt
67
1/19/09 13:08
Wellington_4004_2009_0307_0512.A09 Wellington_4004_2009_0307_0512.txt
70
3/24/09 4:09
Wellington_4004_2009_0512_0618.A09 Wellington_4004_2009_0512_0618.txt
56
5/13/09 9:47

It is important to note that these are the raw files without any compensation for offset. It is also important to note that the temperature was not recorded during this period.

Using this data, an analysis of the wind resource report was developed using Windographer 1.45. For this data an offset of +342° was applied to the wind vane data. For this report, a validation analysis was performed on the data. This data was filtered two ways:

  1. Any wind speed data where the wind speed was less than 1 mph for 2 hours or more was deleted.
  2. Any wind direction data where the wind direction varied by less than 3 degrees over 6 hours was deleted

Windographer was then used to add in synthetic data to these intervals with suspect data. The combined data files (with and without the validation analysis), and the Windographer files (with and without the validation analysis) are given below:

Final Wind Resource Summary

The anemometer tower was removed from the site on June 18, 2009. Highlights of the wind resource at this site for the entire monitoring period are shown below:

Data Properties
Variable
Data Set Starts:
6/12/2008 12:00 MST
Height above ground (m)
20
Data Set Ends:
06/18/2009 7:40
Mean 10 min avg. wind speed (mph)
10.875
Data Set Duration:
12 months
Median 10 min avg. wind speed (mph)
9.00
Length of Time Step:
10 minutes
Min 10 min avg. wind speed (mph)
0.732
Elevation (ft.):
5,323
Max 10 min avg. wind speed (mph)
49.8
Mean air density (kg/m³):
1.046
Mean power density (W/m²)
174
Wind Power Coefficients
Mean energy content (kWh/m²/yr)
1,528
Power Density at 50m:
249 W/m²
Energy pattern factor
2.904
Wind Power Class:
2 (Marginal)
Weibull k
1.511
Wind Shear Coefficients
Weibull c (mph)
12.087
Power Law Exponent:
0.126
1-hr autocorrelation coefficient
0.808
Surface Roughness:
0.01 m
Diurnal pattern strength
0.178
Roughness Class:
0.780
Hour of peak wind speed
16
Roughness Description:
Rough Pasture
Mean turbulence intensity
0.2093
Note: The wind power density and wind power class at 50m are projections of the data from 20m. A surface roughness of 0.01 meters was assumed for this projection. This is equal to that of a rough pasture. This value was then used this to calculate the roughness class and the power law exponent shown above.
Standard deviation (mph)
7.547
Frequency of calms (%)
0.0%
Total data elements
213,592
Suspect/missing elements
39,692
Data completeness (%)
81.4

 

Windographer was used to match up the wind at this site with the performance curves of some common turbines of various sizes and various heights, allowing for losses of about 13%. The table below shows the results. For the larger turbines, the tower height was increased to account for the larger turbine blades - the wind resource was extrapolated to these higher heights. Keep in mind that the larger and the higher the turbine, the better the wind and the greater the output. But of course, as the tower heights and turbine sizes increase so does the cost.

Turbine
Rotor
Diameter
meters
Rotor
Power
kW
Hub
Height
meters
Hub
Height
Wind
Speed
mph
Time
At
Zero
Output
percent
Time
At
Rated
Output
percent
Average
Net
Power
Output
kW
Average
Net
Energy
Output
kWh/yr
Average
Net
Capacity
Factor
%
Bergey Excel-R
6.7
7.5
20
10.87
35.39
4.14
1.1
9,400
14.3
Bergey Excel-S
6.7
10
20
10.87
18.97
2.64
1.2
10,800
12.3
Bergey XL.1
2.5
1
20
10.87
6.94
6.09
0.2
1,500
16.7
Southwest Skystream 3.7
3.7
1.8
20
10.87
33.00
0.00
0.3
2,600
16.3
Southwest Whisper 500
4.5
3
20
10.87
35.38
5.11
0.5
4,600
17.6
Northern Power NW 100/20
20
100
25
11.22
31.42
0.00
12.8
112,400
12.8
Vestas V47 - 660 kW
47
660
65
12.83
27.11
1.40
105.8
927,200
16.0
GE 1.5s
70.5
1,500
81
13.22
33.82
6.09
221.9
1,943,800
14.8
Vestas V80 - 2.0 MW
80
2,000
100
13.62
31.43
3.96
355.1
3,110,600
17.8
GE 2.5xl
100
2,500
110
13.81
24.42
7.04
490.0
4,292,500
19.6

For more information Contact Us!

 



Disclaimer | Equal Opportunity | Contact CSU
© 2008 Mechanical Engineering,
Colorado State University. All Rights Reserved.
Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523 USA (970) 491-7709
Last updated: June 2009
Email questions & comments to: michael@engr.colostate.edu
This page is Javascript enabled. Turn on Javascript to view.