Riso, the National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy at the Technical University of Denmark (Riso DTU), has announced that a wind turbine test center will open in Osterild, Denmark.
The center at Osterild will provide a site for testing large wind turbines up to 250 meters in height and with a capacity of 15 MW to 20 MW. The grid-connection capacity of the entire facility can receive electrical current from seven wind turbines, each up to 16 MW.
The test center can be further expanded according to need. The first wind turbine is expected to be erected between 2011 and 2012. Until that time, smaller wind turbines can be tested at the center, according to Riso DTU.
The Osterild test center will supplement Riso DTU's existing test station for large wind turbines at Hovsore in western Denmark. At Hovsore, only wind turbines of up to 160 meters in height can be tested.
‘Unlike Hovsore, Osterild has both an open landscape and woods so that, of the seven test stands, two of the test sites will be for testing wind turbines in conditions which are prevalent in wooded areas,’ says Peter Hjuler Jensen, head of Riso DTU's wind energy division. ‘This is why Osterild is a fantastic supplement to Hovsore, which is an open, flat area. Osterild provides a perfect mix of open stretches of countryside as well as woodland. It gives us far more varied measuring possibilities, which will contribute many new facets to wind power meteorology.’
With Riso DTU as the lead partner, a consortium has been set up with Vestas, Siemens, Suzlon, Gamesa, DONG Energy, Vattenfall and ABB. This consortium has received funding from the Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Programme for a preliminary project, which will help to assess the possibilities for building an advanced grid-connection facility. The project is expected to be completed at the beginning of 2011.
SOURCE: Riso DTU
