Page 47 - North American Clean Energy September/October 2019 Issue

understand the requirements for using lidar in a bankable wind resource assessment measurement campaign.
Fear #2 — Lidar Ownership Cost. Will it be more than the cost of a met tower?
Although lidar costs more than a standard 60-meter met tower, lidar is significantly less when compared to the cost of a hub-height met tower. And how much is your time worth? Lidar instrumentation rarely requires a permit, so you can quickly begin measurement on site. Plus, lidars have a long lifetime, and reusing lidar on various project sites quickly brings the cost benefit in favor of lidar.
Quieting fears with lidar's value
Lidar provides significant value to developers during wind prospecting.
Measuring with lidar is safer.
There are real safety concerns with met towers. They can be dangerous to install, maintain, and repair, plus heavy snow can weigh down a tower and cause it to collapse. Because small planes have been known to collide with met towers, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) had to provide guidance on marking and registering towers under 80 meters tall; the National Transportation Safety Board updated its safety guidelines in 2018 for pilots regarding met towers.
Alternatively, crews installing remote sensors don’t have to climb a tower for setup. Instead, the device is delivered on site, set at a specific location, and powered up. It weighs less than 100 pounds and is no more than 3 to 4 feet off the ground. As for air traffic safety, the lidar does all the work taking measurements hundreds of meters in the air, with no disruption to pilots.
Small devices pack a massive, mobile punch.
Despite the compact nature of remote sensors in wind measurement, they keep pace with the growing size of wind turbines. Lidar technology in wind measurement sensing can reach up to 300 meters, and provides the accurate data required for a wind resource assessment measurement campaign.
Time is money
Between permitting and installation, met towers take significant time to begin wind prospecting. Developers who use lidar sensing not only shave weeks or months off their development phase, but if they need to move the sensor for a more impactful measurement, they can do that in a matter of hours.
By openly sharing the value and successes of lidar’s use in remote sensing for future wind prospecting, we can - more quickly and cost effectively - get to a place where wind energy is a sustainable and plentiful resource, keeping electricity flowing.
Greg Shambo is the North American regional director of Renewable Energy for Vaisala, Inc. He works with wind developers to adopt innovative solutions to help increase their competitiveness and profitability. He believes that renewable energy can be both a noble cause and a thriving business.
Leosphere, a Vaisala company /// www.leosphere.com
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