Tower Height IS Important

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Can you get more energy production from a taller tower?

The answer is absolutely. The higher the better. Indeed, the height of the tower is a critical component of energy production. We have also designed our towers to be tiltable for easy installation and servicing.

When measuring Energy Capture there are a lot of considerations that one must take into account. Listed below is an example of how to calculate Energy Capture:

One of our customers in Texas is assuming he has an average wind speed of 9.81mph.

Let us also assume the following:

  • Elevation is 1,000ft above sea level.
  • Average temperature is 15°C.
  • Distribution is Rayleigh (Weibull k of 2.0).

Taking the wind speed and running a shear exponent of 0.14 and a tower height of 105ft, we can calculate that 575 kWh/mo would be the expected energy capture for this customer.

Just by increasing the tower height to 126ft, this customer would receive almost 8% more energy – 619 kWh/mo.

If we assume the customer’s terrain is a little more cluttered (trees, hedges,a few buildings), we now have a shear value of 0.29, and on the 126ft tower the customer would now get 1,013 kWh/mo.

If we take the above, but use the 105ft tower, then we would expect 903kWh/mo.

Over 10% more energy capture on the taller tower.

For more information on expected energy capture, please contact us and one of our engineers will help determine this for you in your area.

© 2010, Endurance Windpower.
www.endurancewindpower.com

Posted by Endurance Windpower on Thursday, November 29, 2007

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