The impact of climate change on Swedish wind power production
Typ
Examensarbete för masterexamen
Program
Industrial ecology (MPTSE), MSc
Publicerad
2020
Författare
Bergenjarl, Heléne
Modellbyggare
Tidskriftstitel
ISSN
Volymtitel
Utgivare
Sammanfattning
Global warming is now a fact, making it significant to model the future climate to be as
prepared as possible. The aim of this study was to investigate if and how a warmer climate will
affect the Swedish wind power. Wind power profiles were assessed with focus on recurrence
of low wind periods, to see if they have a risk of becoming more frequent or longer or perhaps
both. The investigation was conducted by analysing wind speed data from two different global
climate models, HadGEM2-ES and MPI-ESM-LR, with the time scope of 2006 to 2099, and
the temporal resolution of 3 h and 6 h, respectively. Both models with the scenarios RCP2.6
and RCP8.5.
The study found a decrease of about 3% of the yearly electricity production from an average
Swedish wind turbine, by the end of the century in the worst-case scenario, corresponding to a
5℃ increase. However, the two models were ambiguous as to whether it is the duration of low
wind events or the number low wind events which increase. The study reached the conclusion
that to be able to say anything for sure, whether a warmer climate does affect the wind patterns,
or not, data from only two models are not enough. It also recommend that for future work it
would be of interest to not only see how many and how long these low wind events are, but
also to see how close to each other they are since this is a major factor when deciding the
substituting energy source when wind turbine are not producing enough, for this study this is
partly handled by using moving averages of 12 h and 24 h, when analysing the profiles.
However, the result from the scenario where the global warming is kept below 1.5℃, shows
no visible change for electricity production from an average Swedish wind turbine.
Nevertheless, the overall results from this study do not indicate any substantial risk for future
wind power owners of being directly affected by the change in production from the wind
turbines as an effect of global warming.
Beskrivning
Ämne/nyckelord
Wind power , low wind events , HadGEM2-ES , MPI-ESM-LR