Wind energy potential calculations in the Marmara region of Turkey

摘要

Presently exploited rates of fossil fuels are expected to be depleted within the next 40-50 years and consequently human beings seek for alternative energy resources which are sustainable clean and friendly with the environment. Accumulation of carbon dioxide in the lower layers of the atmosphere gives way to climate change and consequently to occurrence of floods, intensive rainfalls and droughts. In order to reduce such dangerous effects all the countries of the world have to try and improve their energy resources qualities and if possible to replace the fossil fuels such as coal and fuel with renewable alternatives of wind, solar and solar-hydrogen energies. In such a search, the most important decisions are concerned with the exploitation of local, clean and sustainable energy resources. The determination of wind and solar energy potentials depend very much on the meteorological measurements of the wind direction and velocity and solar irradiation. Unfortunately, in many parts of the world, it is difficult to obtain such data for the potentiality assessments. In this paper, the hourly wind velocity measurements in the Marmara region from 1991 to 1995 are considered for the assessment of wind potential in the region. First of all the validity of univerally accepted Weibull distribution for wind velocities has been checked and it is found that some hours do not comply with this distribution but with the olgarithmic normal distribution. It is observed that in the Marmara region the wind energy generation is more convenient during daily hours especially in the afternoon.