CFD modeling of the Neutral Atmospheric Boundary Layer above Inhomogeneous forest

Abstract

Homogeneous assumption of distribution of forest canopy has been a keen study in several works in assessing the effect of forest canopy on the mean velocity profile and turbulence within a wind farm. While this assumption plays a vital role in wind energy assessment, it doesn’t represent the realistic approach given by the inhomogeneous (heterogeneous) assumption. In this study the Large-Eddy Simulation (LES) is used to model the neutral Atmospheric Boundary Layer (ABL) over a heterogeneous forest wind farm. This is done by utilizing the power of the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) tool, STAR-CCM+ software. Thereafter the structural dynamic response of the wind turbines are assessed using the aero-elastic solver FAST. Comparisons are made between two simulation cases (heterogeneous versus homogeneous forest canopy distribution) and it is seen that the homogeneous forest assumption over-predicts turbulent kinetic energy levels the wind turbines are subjected to compared to the heterogeneous forest assumption.