1980–2010 Variability in U.K. Surface Wind Climate

Journal of Climate - Tập 26 Số 4 - Trang 1172-1191 - 2013
Nick Earl1, Steve Dorling1, Richard Hewston2, R. von Glasow1
1School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom
2Department of Meteorology, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, Hawaii

Tóm tắt

Abstract The climate of the northeast Atlantic region comprises substantial decadal variability in storminess. It also exhibits strong inter- and intra-annual variability in extreme high and low wind speed episodes. Here the authors quantify and discuss causes of the variability seen in the U.K. wind climate over the recent period 1980–2010. Variations in U.K. hourly mean (HM) wind speeds, in daily maximum gust speeds and in associated wind direction measurements, made at standard 10-m height and recorded across a network of 40 stations, are considered. The Weibull distribution is shown to generally provide a good fit to the hourly wind data, albeit with the shape parameter k spatially varying from 1.4 to 2.1, highlighting that the commonly assumed k = 2 Rayleigh distribution is not universal. It is found that the 10th and 50th percentile HM wind speeds have declined significantly over this specific period, while still incorporating a peak in the early 1990s. The authors' analyses place the particularly “low wind” year of 2010 into longer-term context and their findings are compared with other recent international studies. Wind variability is also quantified and discussed in terms of variations in the exceedance of key wind speed thresholds of relevance to the insurance and wind energy industries. Associated interannual variability in energy density and potential wind power output of the order of ±20% around the mean is revealed. While 40% of network average winds are in the southwest quadrant, 51% of energy in the wind is associated with this sector. The findings are discussed in the context of current existing challenges to improve predictability in the Euro-Atlantic sector over all time scales.

Từ khóa


Tài liệu tham khảo

Atkinson, 2006

Barriopedro, 2006, A climatology of Northern Hemisphere blocking, J. Climate, 19, 1042, 10.1175/JCLI3678.1

Barriopedro, 2008, Solar modulation of Northern Hemisphere winter blocking, J. Geophys. Res., 113, D14118, 10.1029/2008JD009789

Boccard, 2009, Capacity factor of wind power realized values vs. estimates, Energy Policy, 37, 2679, 10.1016/j.enpol.2009.02.046

Brayshaw, 2011, The impact of large scale atmospheric circulation patterns on wind power generation and its potential predictability: A case study over the U.K., Renewable Energy, 36, 2087, 10.1016/j.renene.2011.01.025

Brown, S., P.Boorman, R.McDonald, and J.Murphy, 2009: Interpretation for use of surface windspeed projections from the 11-member Met Office Regional Climate Model ensemble. UKCP09 Tech. Note, 22 pp. [Available online at http://ukclimateprojections.defra.gov.uk/media.jsp?mediaid=87947&filetype=pdf.]

Cattiaux, 2010, Winter 2010 in Europe: A cold extreme in a warming climate, Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L20704, 10.1029/2010GL044613

Celik, 2004, A statistical analysis of wind power density based on the Weibull and Rayleigh models at the southern region of Turkey, Renewable Energy, 29, 593, 10.1016/j.renene.2003.07.002

Cheng, 2011, Interannual variability of high-wind occurrence over the North Atlantic, J. Climate, 24, 6515, 10.1175/2011JCLI4147.1

Dacre, 2009, The spatial distribution and evolution characteristics of North Atlantic cyclones, Mon. Wea. Rev., 137, 99, 10.1175/2008MWR2491.1

Forster, D., M.Benzie, S.Winne, and R.Milnes, 2011: Evaluation of the climate risks for meeting the UK's carbon budgets. AEA Technology plc, Rep. for Committee on Climate Change ED56732- 3, 151 pp. [Available online at http://hmccc.s3.amazonaws.com/Progress%202011/ED56732_FinalReport_FINALv2.pdf.]

Gronas, 1995, The seclusion intensification of the New Year's Day storm 1992, Tellus, 47A, 733, 10.3402/tellusa.v47i5.11571

Harrison, 2008, Preliminary assessment of climate change impacts on the U.K. onshore wind energy resource, Energy Sources, 30, 1286, 10.1080/15567030701839326

Hawkins, 2009, The potential to narrow uncertainty in regional climate predictions, Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 90, 1095, 10.1175/2009BAMS2607.1

Hess, 1952

Hewston, R. , 2008: Weather, climate and the insurance sector. Ph.D. dissertation, University of East Anglia, 312 pp.

Hewston, 2011, An analysis of observed maximum wind gusts in the U.K., J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn., 99, 845, 10.1016/j.jweia.2011.06.004

Hurrell, 2003

Irwin, 1979, A theoretical variation of the wind profile power-law exponent as a function of surface roughness and stability, Atmos. Environ., 13, 191, 10.1016/0004-6981(79)90260-9

James, 2007, An objective classification method for Hess and Brezowsky Grosswetterlagen over Europe, Theor. Appl. Climatol., 88, 17, 10.1007/s00704-006-0239-3

Jamil, 1995, Wind power statistics and an evaluation of wind energy density, Renewable Energy, 6, 623, 10.1016/0960-1481(95)00041-H

Jenkinson, 1977

Jones, 1993, A comparison of Lamb circulation types with an objective classification scheme, Int. J. Climatol., 13, 655, 10.1002/joc.3370130606

Jones, 1997, Extension to the North Atlantic oscillation using early instrumental pressure observations from Gibraltar and south-west Iceland, Int. J. Climatol., 17, 1433, 10.1002/(SICI)1097-0088(19971115)17:13<1433::AID-JOC203>3.0.CO;2-P

Jung, 2011, Origin and predictability of the extreme negative and NAO winter of 2009/10, Geophys. Res. Lett., 38, L07701, 10.1029/2011GL046786

Justus, 1976, Nationwide assessment of potential output from wind powered generators, J. Appl. Meteor., 15, 673, 10.1175/1520-0450(1976)015<0673:NAOPOF>2.0.CO;2

Klawa, 2003, A model for the estimation of storm losses and the identification of severe winter storms in Germany, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 3, 725, 10.5194/nhess-3-725-2003

Kremer, 1998

Lockwood, 2010, Are cold winters in Europe associated with low solar activity?, Environ. Res. Lett., 5, 024001, 10.1088/1748-9326/5/2/024001

Lockwood, 2011, The solar influence on the probability of relatively cold U.K. winters in the future, Environ. Res. Lett., 6, 034004, 10.1088/1748-9326/6/3/034004

Malmquist, 1999

McCallum, 1990, The Burns' day storm, 25 January 1990, Weather, 45, 166, 10.1002/j.1477-8696.1990.tb05607.x

Motta, 2005, The influence of non-logarithmic wind speed profiles on potential power output at Danish offshore sites, Wind Energy, 8, 219, 10.1002/we.146

Munich Re, 2002

Osborn, 2011, Winter 2009/2010 temperatures and a record-breaking North Atlantic Oscillation index, Weather, 66, 19, 10.1002/wea.660

Oswald, 2008, Will British weather provide reliable electricity?, Energy Policy, 36, 3212, 10.1016/j.enpol.2008.04.033

Petersen, 1998, Wind power meteorology. Part I: Climate and turbulence, Wind Energy, 1, 25, 10.1002/(SICI)1099-1824(199804)1:1+<25::AID-WE4>3.3.CO;2-4

Pöyry, 2011: The challenges of intermittency in North West European power markets. Summary Rep., 16 pp.

Pryor, 2010, Climate change impacts on wind energy: A review, Renewable Sustainable Energy Rev., 14, 430, 10.1016/j.rser.2009.07.028

Pryor, 2004, Can satellite sampling of offshore wind speeds realistically represent wind speed distributions? Part II: Quantifying uncertainties associated with sampling strategy and distribution fitting methods, J. Appl. Meteor., 43, 739, 10.1175/2096.1

Pryor, 2012, Analyses of possible changes in intense and extreme windspeeds over northern Europe under climate change scenarios, Climate Dyn., 38, 189, 10.1007/s00382-010-0955-3

Rodwell, 1999, Oceanic forcing of the wintertime North Atlantic Oscillation and European climate, Nature, 398, 320, 10.1038/18648

Scaife, 2012

Seguro, 2000, Modern estimation of the parameters of the Weibull wind speed distribution for wind energy analysis, J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn., 85, 75, 10.1016/S0167-6105(99)00122-1

Serreze, 1997, Icelandic low cyclone activity: Climatological features, linkages with the NAO, and relationships with recent changes in the Northern Hemisphere circulation, J. Climate, 10, 453, 10.1175/1520-0442(1997)010<0453:ILCACF>2.0.CO;2

Sinden, 2007, Characteristics of the U.K. wind resource: Long-term patterns and relationship to electricity demand, Energy Policy, 35, 112, 10.1016/j.enpol.2005.10.003

Swiss Re, 2011: Natural catastrophes and man-made disasters in 2010: A year of devastating and costly events. Sigma Rep. 1/2011, 36 pp. [Available online at http://media.swissre.com/documents/sigma1_2011_en.pdf.]

Takle, 1978, Note on the use of Weibull statistics to characterize wind-speed data, J. Appl. Meteor., 17, 556, 10.1175/1520-0450(1978)017<0556:NOTUOW>2.0.CO;2

Troccoli, 2012, Long-term wind speed trends over Australia, J. Climate, 25, 170, 10.1175/2011JCLI4198.1

UKMO, cited 2011: Met Office surface data users guide. [Available online at http://badc.nerc.ac.uk/data/ukmo-midas/ukmo_guide.html.]

Ulbrich, 2009, Extra-tropical cyclones in the present and future climate: A review, Theor. Appl. Climatol., 96, 117, 10.1007/s00704-008-0083-8

Vautard, 2010, Northern Hemisphere atmospheric stilling partly attributed to an increase in surface roughness, Nat. Geosci., 3, 756, 10.1038/ngeo979

Wang, 2009, Trends and variability of storminess in the northeast Atlantic region, 1874–2007, Climate Dyn., 33, 1179, 10.1007/s00382-008-0504-5

Weisser, 2003, A wind energy analysis of Grenada: An estimation using the ‘Weibull' density function, Renewable Energy, 28, 1803, 10.1016/S0960-1481(03)00016-8

Wheeler, 1997

Wilks, 1990, Maximum likelihood estimation for the gamma distribution using data containing zeros, J. Climate, 3, 1495, 10.1175/1520-0442(1990)003<1495:MLEFTG>2.0.CO;2

Woollings, 2010, Dynamical influences on European climate: An uncertain future, Philos. Trans. Roy. Soc., 368A, 3733, 10.1098/rsta.2010.0040

Woollings, 2010, Enhanced signature of solar variability in Eurasian winter climate, Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L20805, 10.1029/2010GL044601

Thông tin
Thông tin xuất bản

Journal of Climate

Tập 26 Số 4

1172-1191

Thông tin tác giả