Wind measurements with drone-based wind lidars

Abstract

In this talk we present the preliminary results of the proof of concept (POC) stage of a drone-based wind lidar system development. For many years, the wind energy community has been in the quest for cost-effective alternatives to wind measurements from tall masts. A potential solution lays in the application of drones as platforms for wind lidars in which the drone would be used to position the lidar in vicinity of the measurement points and steer the outgoing laser beam. By doing this, the wind lidar can be significantly simplified leading to the overall cost reductions. \n\nTo put on trial the proposed solution we have built a proof of concept (POC) drone-lidar system. The system consisted of a dual-telescope CW lidar system built by ZX Lidars, and off-the-shelf drone and gimbal system. The selected drone and gimbal system are typically used in the motion picture industry, while the lidar was optimized for wind tunnel measurements or for turbine blade mounting, thus the telescopes are separated from the rest of the lidar. For the POC we mounted only the telescopes to the gimbal which were placed orthogonal to each other (i.e., 90 degrees opening angle). The telescopes were connected to the lidar located on the ground using 100-m long optical fibers. \n\nTo test the POC drone-lidar system we hovered the drone next to mast-mounted sonic anemometers at the Riso test center. The preliminary results of the intercomparison between the measurements derived from the POC system and one of the sonic anemometers show good agreement. The POC stage results confirmed that the drone-lidar systems could be a potential measurement solution that the community has been looking for.