Copernicus: a booster for the onshore wind energy sector

The UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development sets 17 Goals to be reached by 2030 including to “ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”. In line with the pursuit of this goal, onshore wind is an expanding source of energy in the European Union.

The Copernicus programme, with its full, free and open access to data and Copernicus services´ information, can provide tangible support and benefits to the energy sector by helping optimise the selection of suitable sites for onshore wind farm installations.

The European wind farming history began on 15 April 1982, when the first European onshore wind farm, comprising of 5 turbines, kicked-off its operations on the Greek island of Kythnos. Currently, wind energy is a rapidly growing economic sector. Figures from 2017 show that wind energy covers 11.6% of the EU’s electricity demand, and it has become the second source of power generation capacity in Europe quickly closing in with gas fired installations [1]. In addition, turbine design and manufacturing, electricity production and related industries and economic sectors accounted for 262,712 jobs in the EU in 2016  [2] - which demonstrates that wind energy is also a driver for job creation and growth!

There are two main types of wind energy production facilities, onshore and offshore, each defined by the location of the wind farms. Offshore wind energy relies on the winds over seas and oceans. The construction and maintenance costs of offshore wind farms are considerably higher than those of onshore farms, which are offset by stronger and steadier winds, lower visual impact and efficient use of ocean surfaces. Onshore wind power, on the other hand, is acquired from wind farms installed on land and is a relatively inexpensive source of electric power. In the EU, onshore wind farms are much more common than offshore wind installations – the capacity of energy produced by European onshore wind farms is almost 10 times larger than that of offshore wind farms.

Energy produced in wind farms is generated by large wind turbines harnessing the wind’s power and converting it to electricity. The selection of installation sites of such wind farms is a complex process and requires a meticulous, costly and time-consuming analysis of various criteria involving, for example, terrain analysis, environmental impact studies, wind energy assessment and wind farm installation simulation. Copernicus can provide support in optimising the selection of suitable sites for installation of onshore wind farms.

A good example is offered by Spottitt – a UK-based start-up using Copernicus Sentinel imagery to provide an innovative self-service software for onshore wind farm developers. Spottitt can be used to generate an up-to-date land cover map of any area of interest in the world using only a pair of Sentinel-2 images. This information can be combined with specific software and analysis tools, enabling users to access the most current data for parts of the world for which information is scarce and unreliable, thus saving time and resources. Marcello Deplano, co-founder of Spottitt and beneficiary of the EC’s prestigious Copernicus Accelerator programme, told Copernicus Observer that “Copernicus Sentinel data is paramount for Spottitt because of its global coverage, affordability and frequent update”.

In many ways, Copernicus is proving to be a useful source of information for selecting the best spots for onshore wind farms taking into account the existing constraints for wind turbine installation. Let’s see how!

“ The added value of Copernicus services for the wind energy sector becomes particularly obvious when combining land cover information with surface height information and other complementary data in order to assess the best possible balance between technical feasibility and yield estimates versus environmental hindrance, such as the neighbourhood of residential areas, potential noise pollution, or visual impact on the landscape ”

Hans Dufourmont

Project Manager for the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service at the European Environment Agency

Land available for wind farms

It is first and foremost crucial to know what areas are available for the installation of onshore wind turbines. To perform this task, available locations are mapped according to land use and land cover information. The Copernicus Land Monitoring Service (CLMS) offers valuable information for this purpose via its CORINE Land Cover (Coordination of Information on the Environment Land Cover, CLC). The objective of the CORINE Land Cover is to provide practical information on key land cover and land use aspects at the European level. It provides the onshore wind energy industry with the necessary information to eliminate areas that cannot be used for wind farm installation (e.g. urban areas, forests, etc.), to select the best areas available for use and to estimate accessibility of the wind turbines for their optimal maintenance. By the year 2021, the CORINE Land Cover will receive a very significant upgrade – the next generation CORINE Land Cover product – CLC+. This product will provide wall-to-wall detailed mapping of land cover and land use (minimum mapping unit in the range of 0.5 to 1 ha instead of the current 25 ha) of 39 European countries.

Urban Atlas is another information product of CLMS which can be used for wind farm installations. It provides local land use and land cover data for Functional Urban Areas (FUA) approximately >50.000 inhabitants. If potential installation sites are rural areas situated close to Functional Urban Areas, the Urban Atlas can be a useful tool for exploring the most suitable installation site. Specialised High Resolution local information products such as Riparian Zones and Natura 2000 high resolution geospatial layer can also be useful to enhance the analysis for the candidate location in some specific geographical areas.

Mapping windy locations

Favourable windy locations should be identified to ensure the efficiency of producing electricity for a given wind regime. To identify these areas, various criteria are considered. For instance, the relief of a candidate location should be analysed with respect to lowland/hill landscape, which will help estimate the influence of those land features on wind behaviour. For these purposes, the Digital Elevation Model of the CLMS (EU-DEM) is useful. EU-DEM is available via the Copernicus programme and developed by means of Remote Sensing, it provides surface height information in Europe, thus enabling 3D landscape visualisations. Additionally, the information about the type of land cover surrounding the wind farm (retrieved via CORINE Land Cover) will complement these estimates: forests would decelerate the winds, whereas open or mountainous areas will be windier.

Moreover, the impact of turbines on each other, the so-called wake effect, should be considered. A long trail of wind created by the rotation of the turbine wings can produce a wake effect, which can adversely impact the performance of other turbines in the wind farm. Therefore, it is essential to strategically place the turbines according to the relief specificities of the installation site. EU-DEM can be used for such assessments.

The Fântânele-Cogealac Wind Farm in Romania captured by Copernicus Sentinel-2.
This is the largest onshore wind farm in Europe, with 240 wind turbines.
The white points located in a regular distance from each other are the individual wind turbines.
Contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), generated by the Copernicus Support Office using EO Browser.

The NIMBY of wind farms

Wind farm turbines are commonly seen as unflattering for the natural landscapes and locals would prefer to see them installed in locations least visible from populated or frequently visited areas. Accordingly, forests and hills would create a good barrier between such areas and wind farms. Information on relief and types of land cover provided by the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service products is handy also to cope with this phenomenon, the so-called NIMBY or, “Not In My Backyard”. The 3D models developed using Sentinel-2 data enable to simulate visual impact of a potential wind farm.

Other contributions and applications

Copernicus directly and indirectly assists in other stages of onshore wind turbine installation. For instance, favourable locations for onshore wind farms are also identified by other parameters including, but not limited to the air corridors for low-flying aircraft, the accessibility of the electricity network, meteorological statistics on a location’s typical wind speed and direction, or assessments of noise and the shadow flicker effect due to improperly sited wind turbines, just to mention a few.

As Copernicus is a continuously evolving programme, the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service is developing additional products that can directly benefit the renewable energy sector. More information on the existing and future CLMS products can be found at https://land.copernicus.eu/.