ZephIR Lidar has confirmed that the UK Wind Lidar Production Centre will officially open by the end of 2017, in response to the increasing demand for more accurate wind measurements in the development, construction and operation of wind farms worldwide. The Centre is complete with electronics and optical assembly clean rooms for producing, testing and servicing laser-based lidar units.

In order to produce a packaged 'white box' solution, where the different stages of processing are clearly visible to the user, Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) provider Meteodyn has collaborated with wind lidar company ZephIR Lidar. This addresses the challenge of taking lidar wind measurements in complex terrain. Data from lidars are now widely considered as being bankable for use in wind resource assessment campaigns.

  The international standards and conformity assessment body for all fields of electrotechnology, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), has published a standard to deliver the technical basis for the acceptance of lidar measurements for wind turbine power performance testing and wind resource assessments.

The most widely reviewed industry procedure released to date, describes in a practical manner the main steps to using a nacelle-mounted wind lidar to measure a wind turbine power curve, closely following guidelines such as IEC 61400-12-1 CD. The reviewers include experts from Siemens, DONG Energy, DTU Wind Energy, RES (Renewable Energy Systems) and Natural Power.

What is thought to be the first wind lidar, a ZephIR DM, has been deployed in Morocco, by Moroccan energy company, NAREVA Holding. Demonstrating their leadership in technology solutions to maximise potential project value, the announcement follows the company’s acquisition of the lidar in connection with the 200 MW Akhenfir Wind Farm. 

“By adding ZephIR 300 wind lidars into our anemometry programme we are proactively reducing the uncertainty associated with the wind measurement of our future wind farm developments," says Lambert Kleinjans, Project Manager – Financing and Construction - at EnergieKontor UK. 

Earlier this year Vestas revealed that it was working on optimising wind energy production and lowering the cost of energy by testing a multi-rotor concept demonstrator. Today, it has been confirmed that the concept demonstrator uses the remote sensing technology from ZephIR Lidar, an approved Vestas lidar supplier.

The Block Island Offshore Wind Farm project in Esbjerg, Denmark, has employed the jack-up installation vessel, Brave Tern, from Fred. Olsen Windcarrier.

  The wind lidar, ZephIR 300, shall be used within the Taiwanese wind industry for profiling wind conditions remotely up to 200m without the need of a met mast, as confirmed by Smartec Scientific Corp (Smartec).

Infinis has confirmed the successful installation of a wind lidar in replace of a permanent met mast at its 43 MW A’Chruach Wind Farm. Thought to be an industry first, the company has integrated the lidar – a ZephiR 300 – into the Senvion site SCADA system.

“With lidar-based wind measurements, taken with the ZephIR DM wind lidar, we are able to offer customers a new completely independent power performance test and optimisation for their wind turbines. ZephIR DM is the only lidar capable of full rotor diameter wind measurements, delivering a power curve measurement equivalent to current and future IEC guidelines. BBB has been working with lidar systems now for over five years and we look forwa...

EDF Energy Renewables has successfully deployed wind lidar technology provided by ZephIR Lidar, to optimise site performance at the 144MW Fallago Rig Wind Farm in Scotland. The lidar, a ZephIR DM capable of wind measurements in advance of the turbine, was deployed by EDF ER Asset Management and O&M teams in less than eight hours and was fully operational in just minutes measuring wind data out to 300m in advance of the wind turbine.

ZephIR Lidar has announced the release of a fully-marinised wind lidar, ZephIR 300M, for the offshore wind and meteorological industries, founded on the company’s successful and finance-approved remote wind measurement device, ZephIR 300.

Infinis has announced the adoption of wind lidars from ZephIR Lidar as an alternative to traditional met masts to be deployed on a number of new sites within Infinis’ growing wind energy portfolio.

The University of Malta has successfully brought wind lidar technology to the country, with funding from an EU Project. The industry’s single most validated wind lidar, ZephIR 300, will be utilised by the University to assist with Degree programme course delivery and further research within the academic communities based at the University. Furthermore, the high-resolution 50Hz wind data will aid in the prospecting of coastal wind resources.

Independent renewable energy consultancy Natural Power has released a groundbreaking study to be presented at the EWEA Wind Resource Assessment workshop, Helsinki, that will support the replacement of traditional met masts on sites featuring complex terrain, with a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) converted lidar campaign featuring ZephIR 300.

The EOLOS floating buoy featuring a ZephIR wind LiDAR, one of KIC InnoEnergy’s start-up projects, has won the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT) Innovators Award at the InnovEIT conference, Budapest, in recognition of the product’s potential to have a significant societal and economic impact.

AXYS Technologies is looking to set the standard in floating lidar devices, having deployed a dual ZephIR 300 arrangement on the company's WindSentinel buoy, a world first. The WindSentinel ‘floating laboratory’ delivers a customised full suite of meteorological and metocean data, in addition to the wind speed & direction data used for resource assessment, to better inform the development of offshore wind farms.

ZephIR Lidar has announced that it has installed a turbine-mounted ZephIR DM wind lidar on the 270 MW Lincs Offshore Wind Farm, located 5 miles from the Skegness coast and operated by Centrica, Siemens Project Ventures and DONG Energy. The installation of the unit will help to identify opportunities where an improvement to production from the installed 75 Siemens 3.6 MW wind turbine generators can be achieved.

A pair of continuous wave ZephIR 300 wind lidars have been acquired by Ivy League institution Cornell University. The Lab took possession of two ZephIR 300 lidars, specialist equipment for ground-based remote sensing of wind flow in the atmosphere. The University selected ZephIR 300 in order to accurately, precisely measure the wind and turbulence interactions between the atmosphere and wind turbines.