Offshore wind energy potential for Bahrain via multi-criteria evaluation

Abstract

Current global commitments to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases encourage national targets for renewable generation. Due to its small land mass, offshore wind could help Bahrain to fulfil its obligations. However, no scoping study has been carried out yet. The methodology presented here addresses this research need. It employs analytical hierarchy process and pairwise comparison methods in a geographical information systems environment. Publicly available land use, infrastructure and transport data are used to exclude areas unsuitable for development due to physical and safety constraints. Meteorological and oceanic opportunities are ranked and then competing uses are analyzed to deliver optimal sites for wind farms. The potential annual wind energy yield is calculated by dividing the sum of optimal areas by a suitable turbine footprint to deliver maximum turbine number. In total, 10 favourable wind farm areas were identified in Bahrain’s territorial waters, representing about 4% of the total maritime area, and capable of supplying 2.68 TWh/year of wind energy or almost 10% of the Kingdom’s annual electricity consumption. Detailed maps of potential sites for offshore wind construction are provided in the article, giving an initial plan for installation in these locations.

Potential of Utilization of Renewable Energy Technologies in Gulf Countries

“…No detailed studies of potential energy production from offshore renewables were previously conducted for Bahrain. This work displays the capability of offshore wind to contribute to Bahrain's future renewable energy mix [130]. The major offshore wind capacity potential determined in this study in Saudi Arabia has 17 GW, followed by Oman with 8 GW and Kuwait with 4.9 GW.…”

Feasibility of Utilizing Wind Electricity for King Abdulla Medical City (KAMC) at Kingdom of Bahrain

“…There is plenty of data that support the utilization of wind energy for KAMC. Some papers were published in the early 1990s, including (Abdulla, 1992), (Alnaser, 1995), (Baharna and Mahdi, 1991), (Feregh, 1993), (Som and Rajab, 1993), and others as recent as 2019-2020 like that of (Haji, et al, 2019) and (Elgabiri, et al, 2020). Analysis conducted by the University of Bahrain on the 10-year wind data set from the meteorological weather station shows that Bahrain enjoys an annual mean wind speed of 6.9 m/s at 60 m height (extrapolated), resulting in an average annual power density of 440 W/m 2 (Al Buflasa, et al, 2007).…”

“…(Alnaser and Alnaser, 2011) has also worked out the cost of power production in the GCC region from wind power plants. (Elgabiri, et al, 2020). The KAMC site is located in the southern part of Bahrain, where if offshore wind turbines are used, then the wind speed, at 150 m above sea level, would be about 6.8 m/s.…”

“…This is enough to power 73 houses, each consuming a monthly average of 5,000 kWh of electricity. In their assessments (Elgabiri, et al, 2020), they used Vesta V150 for power calculations (Vestas Wind Systems, 2018). In low wind sites, it is better to choose a turbine with a large rotor diameter and a smaller generator which even at low speeds allows enough torque to be produced by the rotor to drive the generator (Schaarup and Krogh, 2001).…”

Assessment of wind energy potential and characteristics in Qatar for clean electricity generation

“…Similarly, studies in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region have also been performed. The previous findings highlighted that the Arabian Gulf central region (Bahrain, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia) presents adequate wind potential to install wind farms up to a large scale depending on its location (Al-Salem et al, 2018;Elgabiri et al, 2021).…”