Offshore wind maps from ERS-2 SAR and wind resource modelling

ERS-2 SAR satellite scenes in PRI format are calibrated and processed into offshore wind maps for a site in the North Sea. The wind direction is retrieved by the two-dimensional Fast Fourier transform method, and the wind direction is used as input to the CMOD-IFR and CMOD-4 scatterometer algorithms for the calculation of wind speed maps. The wind speed maps are regridded to 400 m by 400 m in order to reduce noise. Each of the wind maps are compared to high-quality meteorological in-situ observations collected from a 62 m tall mast located 14 km offshore. The development of offshore wind farms is in rapid growth. In the planning phase of such wind farms, it is important to asses the wind resources. A new wind resource mapping method based on satellite SAR images may prove useful. A pc-software has been developed for applied use and is presented here.