Normal and Extreme Wind Conditions for Power at Coastal Locations in China

PLoS One. 2015 Aug 27;10(8):e0136876. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0136876. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

In this paper, the normal and extreme wind conditions for power at 12 coastal locations along China's coastline were investigated. For this purpose, the daily meteorological data measured at the standard 10-m height above ground for periods of 40-62 years are statistically analyzed. The East Asian Monsoon that affects almost China's entire coastal region is considered as the leading factor determining wind energy resources. For most stations, the mean wind speed is higher in winter and lower in summer. Meanwhile, the wind direction analysis indicates that the prevalent winds in summer are southerly, while those in winter are northerly. The air densities at different coastal locations differ significantly, resulting in the difference in wind power density. The Weibull and lognormal distributions are applied to fit the yearly wind speeds. The lognormal distribution performs better than the Weibull distribution at 8 coastal stations according to two judgement criteria, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and absolute error (AE). Regarding the annual maximum extreme wind speed, the generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution performs better than the commonly-used Gumbel distribution. At these southeastern coastal locations, strong winds usually occur in typhoon season. These 4 coastal provinces, that is, Guangdong, Fujian, Hainan, and Zhejiang, which have abundant wind resources, are also prone to typhoon disasters.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • China
  • Cyclonic Storms
  • Meteorology
  • Wind*

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Knowledge Innovation Project of Chinese Academy of Sciences (KZCX2-EW-QN209), Chinese Academy of Sciences (http://www.cas.cn/) to MG, Project and grant number:National High Technology Research and Development Program of China(2013AA06A211-4), Ministry of Science and Technology of China (http://www.most.gov.cn/) to MG, Project and grant number:Public S&T Research Funds Projects of Ocean(20100509), State Ocean Adminstration of China (http://www.soa.gov.cn/) to XW. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.