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Wind Power GlossaryAn explanation of technical terms used in the wind power industry and, more specifically, as used in 'Wind in the Bush'Created about 2008/03/01, modified 2012/05/02 Contact: email daveclarkecb@yahoo.com Also see Energy Units, an explanation of some energy units, definitions, and conversions. |
Wind power pages...Wind power in AustraliaWind farms in NSW Wind farms in Qld Wind farms in SA Wind farms in Victoria Wind farms in Tasmania Wind farms in WA Wind news Wind power potential in Oz Wind power problems Wind farm photo pages...Canunda/Lake BonneyHallett Mount Millar Snowtown Starfish Hill Victoria Wattle Point |
| Some of these definitions were taken from ReNew, the quarterly journal of the Alternative Technology Association |
| 16 point compass rose | To describe the location of wind farms, in relation to well known
towns and cities, I have used the 16 point compass rose.
In this system, north-east (NE) is the direction half way between north
and east (45° 'true') and nor-nor-east (NNE) is the direction half
way between north and north-east (22.5° true), etc. Putting it another way, starting at north and moving clockwise we have: N, NNE, NE, ENE, E, ESE, SE, SSE, S, SSW, SW, WSW, W, WNW, NW, NNW, and back to N. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| AEMO | The Australian Energy Market Operator "delivers an array of gas and electricity market, operational, development and planning functions". The data provided on power generation are difficult to make use of, see ALG, below. AEMO replaced NEMMCO. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ALG | Australian landscape guardians (ALG), a group opposed to wind power and apparently not much concerned about any other 'threats to Australian landscapes'. They have connections to the Waubra Foundation, the mining industry, and the right wing think tank the Institute of Public Affairs and its misleadingly named off-shoot the Australian Environment Foundation. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Amp or Ampere | The SI unit of electric current; the symbol is A or I. Compare to volt. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Anemometer | A device used to measure wind speed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Annual production | As used in these pages, the annual average energy production of a particular wind farm. Generally measured in GWh. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Availability | The percentage of time that the particular wind farm, or wind turbine, is in an operational condition. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Axial-flow turbine | A turbine in which the air moves in the direction of the axis of rotation of the turbine. All utility scale wind turbines in Australia are axial flow. Compare to cross-flow turbine. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Base load | The exact meaning of Base-load seems ill-defined.
The term base-load power was used to mean the load that was always present
and could be supplied by power that comes from generators
such as coal-fired stations, which can only very slowly vary their
generation, and therefore were suited to running night and day at a steady
rate.
It seems to have come to mean the sum of all those loads on the electricity
grid when the time-dependent loads are no longer present.
It roughly corresponds to the demand that is always present in a particular
power grid; equal to the demand from around 11pm to around 6am.
It has often been said that wind power cannot provide base-load power. What seems to be meant by this is that wind power is not available on demand; which is true. See also Timing of wind power generation. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Betz Limit | The maximum theoretical power that can be captured by a wind turbine from the wind. Equal to 59.3% of the wind energy. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Blade |
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| Capacity factor | Sometimes called load factor; the percentage of potential generation
that is actually achieved.
(See also Wind is
intermittent.)
For example; A wind farm consisting of ten 2
MW turbines could
theoretically generate 175 200
MWh of electricity per year
(10×2×24×365=175 200) if all the turbines were to work
at 100% of their capacity 100% of the time.
In practice turbines do not work at full capacity all the time (no
power generation system does) and such a
wind farm in Australia would probably generate around 60 000MWh
per year (a capacity factor of 34%).
See also notes on actual
capacity factors in
Australian wind farms.
A typical capacity factor for a small photovoltaic system, for comparison, is around 20%. The capacity factor used for wind farms is very similar to the load factor used in electrical engineering. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Cross-flow turbine | A turbine where the flow of air is at right angles to the axis of rotation of the turbine. Compare to axial-flow turbine. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Current | The rate at which electricity flows in a conductor. Analogous to the volume of water flowing through a pipe. Measured in Amperes, or Amps. Compare to volt. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Darrius rotor or turbine | A form of vertical-axis wind turbine that uses thin blades | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| dB, Decibel |
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| dB(A) | Sound volume, as perceived by humans, is dependent on the pitch of the sound. A sound reading shown as dB(A), or dBA, indicates that the scale is adjusted to match human perception. The dB(A) scale adjusts absolute dB readings of sound levels from very low frequency sounds, infrasound, downward because of this human perception. So an infrasound level of, say 110dB on the absolute scale, would be adjusted to something well below 110 on the dB(A) scale. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| DEWHA | Commonwealth Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Diameter | When applied to a wind turbine it is the diameter of the area swept by the turbine blades: the diameter of the Swept area. The blade length will be less than half of the diameter. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Efficiency of wind turbines | The Betz Limit gives a theoretical maximum to wind turbine efficiency of 59.3%. The efficiency of wind turbines varies greatly – must vary greatly – depending on wind speed; it is discussed in more depth elsewhere on these pages. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Energy | Energy in physics is the capacity for doing work. Compare to Power. In the SI metric units energy is measured in Watt-hours (Wh), kilowatt-hour (kWh), etc. As examples, an amount of energy is used to pump a quantity of water from a low place to a high place; an amount of energy is required to move a vehicle from point A to point B; an amount of energy is required to boil a litre of water. Also see Units of energy. Many people, even in the energy business, confuse power and energy. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| EPC | Engineering, Procurement and Construction; refers to the major sections in the setting-up of a wind farm. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ESIPC (SA) | The Electricity Supply Industry Planning Council has been established to monitor the electricity supply industry in South Australia. At 1 July 2009 ESIPC became a part of AEMO. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Exawatt-hour, EWh | A unit of energy equal to one billion billion (1018) Watt-hours. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Expected life | A wind turbine and a wind farm has a limited life expectancy. Parts wear out and, in a fast developing field such as wind power, machinery becomes out-dated. Underground electrical cabling deteriorates with time. Some parts can be replaced as they wear or fail, but there comes a time when the most economic option is to replace, or scrap, the whole wind farm. We in Australia must be careful that failed turbines never litter our ridge-lines. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Footing | The footing is the base, usually concrete, that secures the turbine in place. It is sometimes wrongly called the foundation. There are two main types of wind turbine footings. If a turbine is built on bed-rock it can make use of rock anchors to secure a relatively small concrete footing (about 220 tonnes for a 2MW turbine) to the underlying bed-rock. If there is no shallow bed-rock, or the bed-rock is shattered, then heavier footings (gravity footings: about 800 tonnes for a 2MW turbine), that are capable of holding the turbine in place without any attachment to underlying materials, must be used. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Furling | A method of preventing damage to horizontal-axis wind turbines by automatically turning them out of the wind using a spring-loaded tail or other device. Not used on utility-scale wind turbines. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gigawatt, GW | A unit of power equal to one billion (109) Watts. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Greenhouse gas saving |
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| Greenhouse intensity |
The higher the number for greenhouse intensity, the 'dirtier' the fuel is considered to be in relation to climate change. (Also see Carbon intensity.) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gigawatt-hour, GWh | A unit of energy equal to one billion (109) Watt-hours. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HVDC | High voltage direct current is used to transmit large amounts of power over long distances; there are smaller power losses and the construction cost of a HVDC line is less than that of a more conventional high voltage alternating current line. HVDC could be used to advantage for some of the longer transmission lines in Australia, especially if full use it to be made of Australia's great wind power potential. Also see Wikipedia. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Horizontal-axis turbine | The most common form of wind turbine, in which the axis is parallel to the direction of the wind. Another name for a axial-flow turbine. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hub | The section which connects the turbine blades to the main shaft. At construction it is usually attached to the blades at the base of the turbine tower and then the whole assembly is lifted in one piece. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Infrasound | According to the International Electrotechnical Commission's (IEC's) IEC 1994, infrasound is: Acoustic oscillations whose frequency is below the low frequency limit of audible sound (about 16 Hz). However this definition is incomplete as infrasound at high enough levels is audible at frequencies below 16 Hz. (From AWEA & CWEA report into the health effects of wind turbine noise; see elsewhere.) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Installed capacity | The amount of electricity that will be generated by a wind farm when all its turbines are generating at their full capacity. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Inverse square law | This physical
law has been known since the seventeenth century and applies to things
like gravitation, electrostatics, light and sound.
It describes how the strength of something like sound decreases with the
distance from the source; putting it simply, doubling the distance from
the source causes the strength (loudness) to decrease to a quarter,
trebling the distance reduces the strength to a ninth, four times the
distance a sixteenth the strength, etc.
The inverse square law applies to anything that radiates from a distinct source. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Katabatic wind | A cold wind that flows downhill and is powered by gravity. The term is generally used for winds that blow off the Antarctic Plateau toward the coast, although it could also be applied to gully winds. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| kilowatt, kW | A unit of power equal to one thousand Watts. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| kilowatt-hour, kWh | A unit of energy equal to one thousand Watt-hours. One kWh is sufficient to heat about 11 litres of water from room temperature (20°) to boiling point, or to run a 22W compact fluorescent light bulb for 45 hours. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Load factor | See Capacity factor. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Latitude | Distance south of the equator expressed in degrees. In these pages I have used decimal degrees rather than minutes and seconds as fractions of degrees because I believe the latter to be archaic: as shillings and pence are archaic fractions of a pound (currency). | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Longitude | Distance east of the Prime Meridian expressed in degrees. See also latitude, above. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Minimum operational wind speed |
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| Minimum wind speed for full output | The lightest wind sufficient for a particular turbine to produce its maximum rated electricity generation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| MRET | Mandatory Renewable Energy Target; I have discussed it elsewhere. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Megawatt, MW | A unit of power equal to one million Watts. One MW is enough power for around 430 electric kettles (2300W) or 45 000 compact fluorescent light bulbs (22W each). Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Megawatt-hour, MWh | A unit of energy equal to one thousand kWh one million Watt-hours. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Nacelle | That part of the turbine that houses the gearbox (if any), electrical generator, cooling system etcetera, at the top of the tower. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| NEMMCO | The National Electricity Market Management Company is the market operator of the National Electricity Market (NEM) and the system operator of the national grid. Has been replaced by AEMO. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Nocebo effect | The placebo effect is when people who undergo some treatment that could not physically or chemically alleviate their symptoms experience an improvement just because they believe that the treatment is helping them. The Nocebo effect is the opposite. It is when people become ill because of an unfounded belief that something is causing them to be ill. The Skeptic's Dictionary has a fuller explanation. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Peak load | Peak load (or peak demand) is that time when the demand for electricity is at its greatest. In Australia it tends to come at around 6pm on exceptionally hot days, when many people are coming home from work, switching on air conditioners, and preparing dinner. It is important because it is the time when both the electrical generation system and transmission system is under greatest stress. They are largely designed with the aim of coping as well as possible with peak demand. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Petawatt-hour, PWh | A unit of energy equal to one million billion (1015) Watt-hours. Also see Metric system multipliers. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Power | Compare to energy. Power is a flow of energy; an amount of energy per unit time. In the SI metric units, it is measured in Watts (W), kilowatts (kW), etc. Also see Units of Power. As examples, an amount of power is required to push a car at a given speed (under specific conditions) and an amount of power is required to run an electric jug every second that it is switched on. Many people, even in the energy business, confuse power and energy. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Power purchase agreement |
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| Price elasticity of electricity demand | A measure of how electricity demand responds to changes in the price of electricity. For example the AEMO in 2011 estimated the price elasticity in South Australia "to be -0.25, with slightly less than half this applying to peak demand (that is, a 4% real rise in prices is expected to lead to a 1% reduction in sales and a 0.5% reduction in peak demands)". | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Productive wind speeds | That range of wind speeds that are useable by a particular wind turbine for electricity generation. The power available from wind is proportional to cube of the wind's speed: double the speed, eight times the energy. So as the speed of the wind falls the amount of energy that can be got from it falls very rapidly. On the other hand, as the wind speed rises, so the amount of energy in it rises very rapidly; very high wind speeds can overload a turbine. Productive wind speeds for a modern turbine might be from around 2.5m/sec to 35m/sec (9km/hr to 125km/hr). See also Survival wind speed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Renewable energy | Energy that is produced from a renewable source, such as sunlight, flows of wind or water, or sustainably grown plants. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rock anchor | If suitable rock is situated beneath the turbine footing steel rods are used to anchor the turbine and footing to the underlying bedrock, reducing the amount of concrete that would otherwise be necessary. If there is no bedrock within a few metres of the surface, or if the bedrock is highly weathered or fractured, then gravity footing are needed. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rotor | The blades and hub at the centre of the blades - the part that rotates in front of the Nacelle. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rotor diameter | The diameter of the circle swept-out by the tips of the turbine's blades. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Savonius turbine or rotor | A type of vertical-axis turbine that uses half-drum shaped 'blades' to catch the wind and turn a shaft. Generally a low-speed turbine with high torque, usually used for water pumping. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Shut down wind speed | The maximum wind speed at which a particular turbine can generate electricity. With higher wind speeds the turbine must be shut-down to avoid damage. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| SOO; Statement of opportunities, NEMMCO |
- electricity supply capacity; - demand-side participation (DSP); and The SOO incorporates the Annual National Transmission Statement (ANTS). The SOO is published each year in October and can be downloaded from the NEMMCO Net site. Spinning reserve
| In order to assure electrical supply it is necessary to keep some
generation plant (usually fossil-fuelled) running, but not generating, so
that it will be able to be brought into production at short notice.
(The need for spinning reserve would be greatly reduced by introducing
Supply Dependent Load, which is discussed in my
Sustainable Electricity page.)
| Survival wind speed
| The maximum wind speed that a turbine is
designed to withstand before sustaining damage.
See also Productive wind speeds
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Swept circle and swept area
| The circle through which the turbine blades rotate and the area of
that circle.
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Terawatt-hour, TWh
| A unit of energy.
One TWh is a million-million Watt-hours.
Also see Metric system multipliers.
| Tip-speed ratio
| The ratio of the blade tip speed to wind speed
| Turbine
| A device that converts the energy in a stream of moving fluid into
mechanical energy.
| Turbulence
| Airflow that varies in speed and direction rapidly and violently that
can cause damage to wind turbines.
Often caused by objects such as trees or buildings.
| Vertical-axis turbine
| A wind turbine with the axis or main shaft mounted vertically.
This type of turbine does not have to turn to face the wind.
Types include the Darrius and
Savonius.
| Volt, voltage
| The volt is the SI unit of electric potential.
Voltage is analogous to the pressure of water in a pipe.
Compare to Amp and current.
| Watt
| The basic SI metric unit of
power; equal to one Joule of
work performed
per second; also, in electricity, the power dissipated in an electrical
conductor carrying one ampere current between points at one volt potential
difference.
Also see Units of power.
| Watt-hour, Wh
| A unit of energy,
generally electrical energy, equal to a flow of power
of one Watt for a period of one
hour.
| Wind farm
| An integrated group of wind
turbines that
feed electricity into one or more electrical sub-stations and thence,
usually, into the electricity grid.
| Wind turbine
| A turbine designed to
convert the energy in a
stream of moving air into mechanical, and then electrical, energy.
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