RES, alongside ZX Lidars and KK Wind Solutions, has developed a Retrofit Lidar Assisted wind farm Control System (ReLACS) which will improve the performance of existing wind farms.
The product will be trialled by TRIG, the British investment trust dedicated to investing in renewable assets, at several of its onshore wind farms across the UK, starting with Altahullion Wind Farm in Northern Ireland. ReLACS combines the expertise of the three partners in their respective fields. The product consists of three distinct upgrades to each wind turbine on site:
- Turbine controller retrofit – retrofitting controllers onto existing operating models enables access to modern algorithms that can optimise turbine performance, reduce loads and enable new control and monitoring systems to be added.
- Wind Farm Control, Wake Steering – yawing the turbine deflects the wind flow and provides overall energy gain.
- Lidar Assisted Turbine Control (LAC) – Turbine-mounted Lidar can preview wind speeds and turbulence ahead of the turbine, providing optimised feedback that can ultimately reduce turbine loads.