May 26 - July 31
Forecasting Southern Plains Wind Ramp Events Using the WRF Model at 3-KM
Kristen Bradford, Richard Carpenter, and Brent Shaw
Abstract:
Wind ramp events—extreme and rapid changes in wind power output due to abrupt changes in wind speed—are a growing concern for the wind energy industry; therefore, precise forecasting of these phenomena is crucial to the advancement of wind power in the United States. Weather Decision Technologies, Inc., (WDT) is partnering with NanoWeather, Inc., to create a wind forecasting system, called WindPredictorTM, in order to precisely predict winds (and, in turn, ramps) for the energy industry. WDT’s contribution to WindPredictor will be a customized version of the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model, which is currently being run on a 3-km grid. This paper assesses the 3-km WRF’s performance regarding ramp event prediction. A comparison between surface wind forecasts and hourly METAR observations was utilized to assess its performance.