India’s 2021 Monsoon Wind Resource Only Partly Recovers from 2020’s Historical Lows: ArcVera

Consulting and technical services provider ArcVera Renewables said that its April-September 2021 India monsoon wind resource anomaly map points to a modest recovery from the extremely low wind levels recorded in 2020.
 
It further said this year’s monsoon winds have been 5 to 10 per cent below average, causing wind power production for the period to likely be weaker than expected. 
 
Each month, the company publishes Wind and Solar Resource Anomaly Maps on its website to support stakeholders as they seek answers to explain out-of-range power production results. Its anomaly maps are generated from a blend of reanalysis and operational weather data, placed into the context of the 40-year past climate.
 
Its unique blend of data sources allows ArcVera to rapidly paint an accurate picture of the wind or solar resource in the form of maps for a given period of time.  
 
These timely maps contain critical information for project stakeholders who are responsible for monthly project production reports, operations, and answering to investors and owners for production missing or exceeding forecasts. 
 
The company reports and demonstrates with comparative wind resource anomaly maps, that the April-September 2021 wind anomaly over much of India was 5-10 per cent below normal, whereas it was 10-20 per cent below normal for the same period in 2020.
 
Of course, 2020 included the historically low wind month of July, which was the least windy July in the 43-year record of the ERA5 Reanalysis. The 2021 monsoon season has been more consistent and higher than 2020, but still moderately low month to month, rather than being dominated by one extremely low month as in 2020.
 
Commenting on the report, Mark Stoelinga, ArcVera Lead, Atmospheric Science Innovation, said “accurate wind energy resource assessment expertise is critical to the proper evaluation and prediction of future, long-term performance. For the last 30 years, ArcVera has provided the wind industry with its weather forecast acumen and wind energy resource assessment expertise to evaluate and predict future, long-term performance.”
 
He further added “our anomaly maps are just a first step to help India’s project owners and operators conduct a first-view analysis of the impact of resource variations on the power output of their wind and solar assets. We can also produce customized “special circumstance” reports for stakeholders who require a deeper dive into their asset’s production anomalies. Project-specific production anomalies for custom periods can be investigated, including estimated production anomalies based on energy sensitivity to the wind resource as well as production forensics for detailed attribution of production anomaly causes.”
 
The company’s experts apply advanced atmospheric science methods to explain the interannual variability anomalies of the wind energy resource in India. 
 
Wind farm performance expectations depend on the long-term accuracy of wind energy resource assessment. Each year, a wind farms’ performance is typically evaluated by its owner and operator stakeholders to make sure that the variations in the production of the wind farm are explained by variations of the actual wind resource.