Following the launch of its new technology thunderstorm detection system which has significant benefits for the wind energy sector, meteorological equipment specialist Biral’s Alec Bennett has produced a technical white paper on the success of this system in detecting imminent lightning.

Entitled ‘Warning of imminent lightning using single-site meteorological observations’, the paper discusses the effectiveness of meteorological observations made at a site to warn personnel of imminent nearby lightning.

The company’s BTD-300 Thunderstorm Detection system has the ability to detect all forms of lightning within an 83km radius, including warning of potential overhead lightning. The equipment is immune to man-made false alarms making it highly reliable in safety critical situations such as during turbine construction and maintenance. 

This new white paper from Biral is available at https://tinyurl.com/y8bto48v 

Due to climate change, floods, wildfires and other extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense. This scenario poses serious a challenge for current risk management systems and calls for innovative solutions to prevent and fight disasters.

In this context, the I-REACT project is developing an effective solution based on the integration and modelling of data coming from multiple sources. The system will process information from European monitoring systems, earth observations, historical information and weather forecasts, which also will be combined with data gathered by new technological developments created by the project. These include a mobile app and a social media analysis tool to account for real-time crowdsourced information, drones to improve mapping, wearables to improve positioning, as well as augmented reality glasses to facilitate reporting and information visualisation by first responders.

Paris, France 25th June 2018. The Wind Iris TC Lidar has been validated by DNV GL – Energy Renewables Certification to be integrated as a component of today’s advanced wind turbines with respect to Type Certification.

Thanks to the extensive and trustworthy review of all necessary features including design for successful operations, advanced wind measurements capabilities as well as system reliability, lifetime and services, the Wind Iris TC has proved being completely mature and suitable technology to be integrated in an efficient manner into today’s leading-edge wind turbines meeting all the rigorous wind industry standards.

“Wind Iris TC has a high level of maturity and is well prepared for an integration into a wind turbine with respect to Type Certification”, said Steffen Haupt, Head of Department Loads, Sie Conditions & Electrical Engineering. “A subsequent Type Certification process of the newly combined system will be initiated by the wind turbine manufacturer.”