Processing weather forecasts improves accuracy of predictions of wind energy output

Doppler lidar wind observations on the island of Utö show that simple averaging improves the accuracy of predictions of wind energy output based on weather forecasting.

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In the study, comparisons were made of how various post-processing techniques affected the accuracy of output predictions for wind energy. Predictions had been based on weather forecasts.

The results showed that the simplest method, smoothing, improved the accuracy of wind power forecasts more than some of the more complex methods did.

More information:

Researcher Ville Vakkari, Finnish Meteorological Institute, tel. 050 4076133, ville.vakkari@fmi.fi

Hallgren, C., Ivanell, S., Körnich, H., Vakkari, V., and Sahlée, E.: The smoother the better? A comparison of six post-processing methods to improve short-term offshore wind power forecasts in the Baltic Sea, Wind Energ. Sci., 6, 1205–1226, https://doi.org/10.5194/wes-6-1205-2021, 2021.

Scientific article available here

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