Lidar measurements of wind flow characteristics for inland and offshore Wind Eenergy

The paper presents wind flow characteristics at the heights of modern wind turbines obtained from High Resolution Doppler lidar (HRDL) measurements during two past experiments, one of which was conducted in the flat terrain of the US Great Plains, and the other off the New England coast, when HRDL was deployed on the research vessel Ronald Brown. These datasets were chosen because the Great Plains is the region of the high wind resources on land and waters off the New England coast is the region planned for development of wind farms in the near future. Analysis of wind and turbulence characteristics over a wide range of heights, variations of wind shear in time during strong and calm wind nights, along with examples of error in the actual and predicted wind resources will be given.