Novel multipurpose buoy for offshore wind profile measurements EOLOS platform faces validation at ijmuiden offshore metmast

www.sea-technology.com FEATURE / st 1 Relevant advances have been achieved in recent years on buoy-based lidar wind profile measurements. In most of them, data have been demonstrated to fulfill the key performance indicators (KPI) that the offshore wind farm industry requires. Those buoy-based lidar systems are expected to become a suitable alternative to met-tower measurements for site characterization before offshore wind farm construction and also for environmental monitoring once the wind farm becomes operational. Metmasts are as much as ten times more expensive than a floating lidar platform. They need a much longer installation time and are hardly reusable in other locations. A number of buoys holding a lidar system to measure wind profiles have been proposed, with a wide variety of shapes and sizes, ranging from relatively small discus buoys to large structures. On March 17, EOLOS Floating Lidar Solutions (Barcelona, Spain) deployed the buoy EOLOS in the RWE test site off IJmuiden, entering the final validation phase for this newly developed floating structure. The EOLOS buoy is a medium-size, autonomous platform that bases its novelty on a modular design, maximized power generation and storage capacity.