Assessment of wind power predictability as a decision factor in the investment phase of wind farms

The ability to predict wind power production over the next few hours to days is prerequisites for the secure and economic operation of power systems with high wind power penetration. From the point of view of a producer participating in the day-ahead electricity market, lack of predictability at a wind power production site results in imbalance costs. This paper aims at quantifying the impact on market revenue of, respectively, the predictability and the capacity factor of a wind farm or a cluster of wind farms. This is done through a real-life case study in West Denmark, including wind farm production data and market data. Finally, we make a prospective analysis under the assumption that the imbalance price settlement mechanism will remain the same.