Validation and measurements of floating LiDAR for nearshore wind resource assessment application

Validation and measurements of a Floating LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) Device (FLD) were performed at Hsing-Da Harbor in the south of Taiwan from October 16^th to 26^th, 2013. Six range gate heights were set at 50m, 70m, 90m, 110m, 150m and 200m from the FLD sensor lens. Wind speeds, wind directions and turbulence intensities measured by the FLD were compared with those measured by a portable LiDAR, installed on the top of Taiwan Ocean Research Institute (TORI) building. The distance between two LiDARs was about 320m. 1388 available timestamp datapoints were recorded during the deployment campaign. During the test period, the majority of the wind directions were from the north. The averaged wind speeds for the range gate of #1~6 were 4.7, 4.9, 5.3, 5.5, 5.6 and 5.8m/s respectively with the corresponding maximum 10-minute average wind speeds 13.6, 14.2, 14.8, 15.9, 15.9 and 16.9m/s and the averaged turbulent intensities 0.187, 0.190, 0.191, 0.193, 0.197 and 0.192 for the six range gates. The results showed good agreements with 10 minute averaged data of the wind speed and wind direction measured by the two LiDARs. This implied that the motion compensation function of the FLD performed as specified. The present preliminary test and validation results showed good performance from the FLD, which will be a key tool for assessment of offshore wind resources in future offshore wind farm developments.