Wind power forecasting

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While considerable progress has been made in wind power forecasting in the last decade or so, in terms of better understanding of the processes involved and higher accuracy of the forecasts, there is still plenty of scope for improvement. Clearly forecasts for the wind power production of whole regions or supply areas are more accurate than forecasts for particular wind farms due to the smoothing effect of geographic dispersion of wind power capacity. However, with the trend towards large wind farms, and particularly large offshore wind farms, there is a growing requirement for accurate forecasts for individual wind farms. There are considerable differences in the accuracy that can be achieved for wind power forecasts for wind farms located in very complex terrain compared to open flat terrain. Current research on meso scale modelling aims to address this problem. The development of offshore wind power also presents difficult challenges for wind power forecasting. The uncertainty attached to a forecast is a key concern, particularly when looking to the participation of wind power in electricity markets. The area of ensemble forecasting shows potential for further progress. The other area of interest will be the integration of wind power forecasting tools into the energy management systems of TSOs.