Wind energy resource assessment for Suva, Fiji, with accurate Weibull parameters

Abstract

Wind resource assessment is carried out for Suva, the capital of the Republic of Fiji Islands. The wind speeds at 34 m and 20 m above ground level, wind direction, atmospheric pressure, and temperature were measured for more than five years and were statistically analyzed. The daily, monthly, yearly, and seasonal averages were estimated. For the site, the overall average wind speed at 34 m above ground level is found to be 5.18 m/s. The occurrence of effective wind (between the cut-in and cutoff wind speeds of the selected turbine) is predominantly from the east. An effective wind speed of 74.175% was recorded which can be used for power generation. The turbulence intensity and wind shear coefficient are estimated. The site's overall turbulence intensities are 12.5% and 13.72% at 34 m and 20 m above ground level, respectively. The diurnal wind shear correlated with the temperature variation very well. The overall and seasonal wind distributions are analyzed, which shows that the wind speed in Suva is mostly between 3 m/s and 9 m/s although the winter season has higher wind speeds. The Weibull parameters and the wind power density were found using 10 different methods. The wind power density is estimated to be 159 W/m 2 using the best method, which is found to be the empirical method of Justus. A highresolution map around the site is digitized and the wind power density resource map is generated using wind atlas analysis and application program. From the wind atlas analysis and application program analysis, it is seen that Suva has high potential for power generation. Five possible locations are selected for installing wind turbines and the annual energy production is estimated using wind atlas analysis and application program. The total annual energy production from the five sites is 1950 MWh. The average capacity factor of the five turbines is 17%. An economic analysis is performed which showed a payback period of 10.83 years.

Assessment of wind energy potential for Tuvalu with accurate estimation of Weibull parameters

“…As the air gets heated up after sunrise, the inversion effect disappears. Similar observations were made by Aukitino et al (2017) and Kutty et al (2019).…”

“…The equations for finding k and A values using the 10 different methods are presented in Table 3. The detailed description of these methods can be found in Kutty et al. (2019).…”

“…There are five different methods used in this analysis and are tabulated in Table 4: the RMSE (Aukitino et al, 2017;Chaurasiya et al, 2017Chaurasiya et al, , 2018Mohammadi et al, 2016), coefficient of determination (R 2 ; Chaurasiya et al, 2017Chaurasiya et al, , 2018Mohammadi et al, 2016), mean absolute error (MAE; Aukitino et al, 2017;Willmott and Matsuura, 2005), mean absolute percentage error (MAPE; Aukitino et al, 2017;Chaurasiya et al, 2017Chaurasiya et al, , 2018Tofallis, 2015) and coefficient of efficiency (COE; Aukitino et al, 2017;Kaldellis and Zafirakis, 2011;Rocha et al, 2012). The details of these methods can be found in Kutty et al (2019).…”

A renewable energy mix to supply small islands. A comparative study applied to Balearic Islands and Fiji

“…The coefficients of the best Weibull approximation are close the others given by the other GIS tool. Despite this, the comparison of the PDF obtained from the raw wind speed data with the corresponding Weibull approximation reveals that the Weibull distribution does not model properly the wind speed availability, especially in case of low speed values (Kutty et al, 2019). Similar results were obtained in the other references points.…”

Analysis and Assessment of Wind Energy Potential of Socotra Archipelago in Yemen

“…In other words, the energy industry and the environment are in significant crises today. Today in modern societies, energy is the most important indicator of economic growth and many countries worldwide are taking steps toward achieving a renewable energy model to solve this crisis [1,2]. Renewable energy sources such as solar, thermal, geothermal, bioenergy, hydropower, and ocean have gained popularity all over the world due to their distinct characteristics.…”