Vertical Profiles Of Wind Speed Research Articles

An uncertainty methodology for solar occultation flux measurements: ammonia emissions from livestock production

Abstract. Ammonia (NH3) emissions can negatively affect ecosystems and human health, so they should be monitored and mitigated. This study presents methodology for the estimation of uncertainties in NH3 emissions measurements using the solar occultation flux (SOF) method. The reactive nature of NH3 makes its measurement challenging, but SOF offers a reliable open-path passive method which utilizes solar spectrum data, thereby avoiding gas adsorption within the instrument. To compute NH3 gas fluxes, horizontal and vertical wind speed profiles, as well as plume height estimates and spatially resolved column measurements, are integrated. A unique aspect of this work is the first-time description of plume height estimations derived from ground and column NH3 concentration measurements aimed at uncertainty reduction. Initial validation tests indicated measurement errors between −31 % and +14 % on average, which was slightly larger than the estimated expanded uncertainty ranging from ± 12 % to ± 17 %. Application of the methodology to assess emission rates from farms of various sizes showed uncertainties between ± 21 % and ± 37 %, generally influenced by systematic wind uncertainties and random errors. The method demonstrates the capacity to measure NH3 emissions from both small (∼ 0.5–1 kg h−1) and large (∼ 100 kg h−1) sources in high-density farming areas. Generally, the SOF method provided an expanded uncertainty below 30 % in measuring NH3 emissions from livestock production, which could be further improved by adhering to best application practices. This paper's findings offer the potential for broader applications, such as measuring NH3 fluxes from fertilized fields and in the oil and gas sector. However, these applications would require further research to adapt and refine the methodologies for these specific contexts.

Aerodynamic properties of boundary layers along the roof of a large banana screenhouse under near-neutral atmospheric stability

Cultivation under screens and in screenhouses protects the crops from insects and extreme climate conditions and allows water saving. Previous studies considered the aerodynamic properties of boundary layers along two types of screens: a small shading thermal screen covering a hedgerow citrus orchard and a large 50-mesh, insect-proof screen covering a pepper plantation. To extend the previous results, a third type of screen was analysed in this study, a large flat-roof 17-mesh white woven shading screen covering a banana plantation. Vertical profiles of wind speed, air temperature, relative humidity, and friction velocity were measured by a lifting tower, and wind profiles were analysed under near-neutral atmospheric stability. Results show that normalised friction velocity, normalised roughness length, normalised zero plane displacement height and aerodynamic resistance are closer to the previous results of the large insect-proof screenhouse than those of the small shade net.

Enhanced prediction of premonsoon thunderstorms over eastern India through assimilation of INSAT‐3D sounding data

AbstractThe present study assesses the impact of Indian National Satellite 3D (INSAT‐3D)‐derived atmospheric (temperature and relative humidity) profiles on the simulation of severe thunderstorms over eastern India during the premonsoon season. Two sets of numerical experiments, without assimilation (CNTL) and with assimilation of INSAT‐3D profiles (INSAT) have been conducted using the three‐dimensional variational data assimilation system of the Weather Research and Forecasting model for 11 thunderstorm events. Analysis increments are positive with INSAT profile assimilation in the lower to middle atmosphere in the thunderstorm region. The errors in the initial fields have been reduced by approx. 50% after the assimilation. After assimilation, the predictions of the surface fields (2‐m temperature, 2‐m relative humidity, and 10‐m wind speed) have been improved at the mature stage (by 37%, 26%, and 15%) compared to the CNTL. Similar improvements are noticed in the vertical profiles of relative humidity and wind speed in the INSAT experiment. The time and magnitude of updrafts and downdrafts improved in INSAT. After assimilation, rainfall intensity improved in nine cases, and time improved in four cases out of 11. The Critical Success Index (False Alarm Rate) of the INSAT ranges from approx. 0.6–0.15 (∼0.37–0.48) for all thresholds, and are higher (lower) than the CNTL. The rainfall area is improved by 25% for light rainfall, 11% for moderate rainfall, and 2% for heavy rainfall in the INSAT over the CNTL experiment. Overall thunderstorm prediction has been improved with the assimilation of INSAT‐3D data. Thus, the study highlights the viability of INSAT‐3D profiles in improving thunderstorm predictions over eastern India.

A novel empirical model for vertical profiles of downburst horizontal wind speed

AbstractThis study proposes an empirical model for preliminary wind‐resist design of downburst flow. Existing empirical models were compared with field data and found to underpredict horizontal wind speed below the height corresponding to the maximum radial velocity, due to the neglect of viscous effects and the evolution of vertical wind profiles along radial direction. To address these deficiencies, semi‐empirical piecewise functions including wall shear effects in the local turbulent boundary layer and interpolation functions were proposed to improve the accuracy of existing models. The wind profile based on Coles' theory was found to agree well with field data, with the parabola interpolation function being the most desirable. Using the proposed method, the vertical profile of horizontal wind speed at different local radial locations can be predicted for wind resist design given the inlet wind speed of the downburst flow. Overall, this model improves upon existing empirical models and allows for more accurate wind‐resist design.

Wind waves impact on the velocity in wave boundary layer in the condition of dynamically smooth surface

One of the factors of wind wave impact on vertical distributions in atmosphere surface layer is the flux of momentum produced by the wave-produced fluctuations. Wave surface are supposed to be a dynamically rough and effects of the molecular viscosity are neglected. In this paper impact of wave momentum fluxes with values of wind velocity which lead to dynamically smooth ocean surface is estimated. The well-known theoretical aspects and results of experimental research are applied. Dependence of dimensionless thickness of viscosity layer on dimensionless roughness of smooth surface is analyzed. The equations of motion are formed taking into account the manifestation of three factors: molecular, turbulent and wave momentum flux. The models based on these equations are described.The choice of constant coefficients that are set in calculations with this model is considered. Results of calculations and analysis of vertical profiles of wind speed and the dependence of the drag coefficient on wind velocity under various wave age.

Experimental translating downbursts immersed in the atmospheric boundary layer

Thunderstorm winds are cold descending gravity currents whose impingement on the ground creates strong radial outflows with maximum wind speeds in the near-ground region. They represent one of the greatest hazards for natural and built environment as well as one of the deadliest phenomena all over the world. This study carries on the post-processing analyses of the downburst experimental campaign performed at the WindEEE Dome, at Western University in Canada, in the context of the ERC project THUNDERR. While a former study presented the interaction between downburst and atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) winds, here the focus is on the influence exerted by the thunderstorm cloud translation. This was experimentally replicated at large scale by means of impinging jet technique where the jet axis was inclined to a non-zero angle with respect to the vertical. Finally, the inclusion of background ABL wind allowed to reconstruct the complete three-dimensional and non-stationary nature of the phenomenon. The outflow radial symmetry is lost in case of inclined jet axis. This leads to an intensification of the front-wind side and weakening of the rear-wind side, where the entrainment of the counter-directed ABL wind, and consequent flow speed-up, are not as pronounced as in the vertical-axis case. The non-linearity of the complex interaction between downburst, ABL flow and cloud translation is proven and quantified. Vertical profiles of mean wind speed and turbulence intensity are discussed in relation to the mutual interaction among flow components.

Machine learning for predicting offshore vertical wind profiles

The accurate characterization of the vertical wind profile over the sea that covers the rotor swept area of modern wind turbines is a key challenge for wind energy yield calculations. Since offshore wind measurements are scarce, early-phase projects tend to use numerical model outputs before planning a dedicated measurement campaign. This study aims to develop and validate a machine-learning model that can assimilate wind parameters measured at the first level of the meteorological masts as input and provide a wind speed profile covering the rotor swept area of modern turbines that is more accurate than numerical weather prediction models. The methodology is based on a random forest model implemented in the python package Scikit-Learn. Three offshore sites in the North Sea have been selected for this study, namely FINO3, IJmuiden and Nordsee Ost’s (NSO) met mast, which are 100 to 350 km apart. Each site has an instrumented 100-m meteorological mast along with a Doppler wind lidar measuring up to 300 m. The baseline selected for comparison was the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model. To assess the accuracy of the random forest model two models were trained at IJmuiden and FINO3 and tested at all three locations. Hence, we examine the model performance at the site of training, the so-called same site approach, as well as new sites, the so-called round robin approach. The same site approach quantifies the model consistency, while the round robin shows the degree of spatial robustness. The results show that the model is consistent, where the model trained and tested at FINO3 showed a mean absolute error (MAE) reduction of 68% compared to WRF. This model is also robust, when applied at IJmuiden, 350 km away with a MAE of 1.2 m/s, 8% improved compared to WRF outputs. This study therefore shows the potential to implement machine-learning methods in the prediction of vertical wind speed profiles over the sea. One potential application for the presented methodology is the extension of wind profiles measured by floating lidar systems to higher heights, where current wind lidar products have low availability and higher associated uncertainties, when measuring at a higher height.

The development and validation of the Inhomogeneous Wind Scheme for Urban Street (IWSUS-v1)

Abstract. The layout of urban buildings shows significant heterogeneity, which leads to the significant spatial inhomogeneity of the wind field in and over the canopy of urban street canyons. However, most of the current urban canopy models do not fully consider the heterogeneity of the urban canopy. Large discrepancies thus exist between the wind speeds simulated by the current urban canopy models and those observed in the street canyon. In this study, a parameterization scheme for wind fields, Inhomogeneous Wind Scheme for Urban Street (IWSUS), is developed to better characterize the heterogeneity of the urban canopy. We use a computational fluid dynamics method to generate the IWSUS scheme and compare it with observations of the wind profile and turbulent flux in and over the street canyon for validation. In IWSUS, the wind speed vertical profiles at six representative positions located in a typical street canyon (i.e., the windward or leeward side of a long straight street or the inflow or outflow end) are parameterized separately. The wind profile by IWSUS thus can better describe the horizontal heterogeneity of the urban near-surface wind field, e.g., the dynamic drag effect of buildings in the lower atmospheric layer over the urbanized land use. The validation based on observations shows that the performance of simulation results by IWSUS is better than that by the exponential–logarithmic (exp-log) law widely used in the current urban schemes. We consider typical building arrangement and specific street orientations in IWSUS for wind field simulations, which can better match the distribution characteristics of street canyons around the observation point in the street canyon. The averaged wind profiles and turbulence energy fluxes in the model grids of urban areas by IWSUS are also nearer to the observations than those by the exp-log law. The normalized mean errors (NMEs) between the simulated and the observed vertical average wind speed are 49.0 % for IWSUS and 56.1 % for exp-log law in the range from the ground to 4 times the average height of the buildings and 70 % for IWSUS and 285.8 % for exp-log law in the street canyon (range from the ground to building top). This study proves that the accuracy of simulations of land surface processes and near-ground meteorological processes over the urban canopy can be improved by fully considering the heterogeneity of the urban canopy layout structures and the inhomogeneity of wind field distributions in and over the street canyon. IWSUS is expected to be coupled with mesoscale atmospheric models to improve the accuracy of the wind field, land surface energy budget, meteorological and atmospheric chemistry simulations.

Numerical simulation research on the overturning of gantry crane by downbursts

Based on the simulation of the fluid-structure interaction response, the cause of an overturning of a gantry crane induced by a downburst in Shenzhen is studied in this paper. According to the results, (1) Vicroy's downburst model could establish the steady-state wind field of the downburst more reasonably when there was only low-level wind speed observation data, and its simulation results were close to the two-dimensional downburst numerical simulation results; (2) Compared with the normal exponential vertical profile of wind speed, the disturbance caused by the front girder of the double-girder gantry crane structure under the downburst wind field was more severe, which increases the probability of the gantry crane overturning. (3) The downwind displacement of the main girder of the gantry crane under the condition of downburst is far greater than that under the normal condition. At the same time, under the condition of downburst, the pressure difference on the surface of the gantry crane was greater, and the distribution of the support reaction force was more uneven, resulting in a stronger overturning tendency of the gantry crane. (4) Under the condition of downburst, the overturning moment and the shearing force borne by the foundation of gantry crane exceeded the critical value to maintain the stability of the gantry crane by the gravity, resulting in the overturning of the gantry crane.

Inertial and roughness sublayer flows over real urban morphology: A comparison of wind tunnel experiment and large-eddy simulation

Turbulent flows in the inertial sublayer (ISL) and the roughness sublayer (RSL) are highly complicated by real urban surfaces with various building heights and scales. This study used wind tunnel (WT) modeling and large-eddy simulation (LES) to examine the flow structure in the ISL and RSL over a real urban district of Hong Kong. Although random vertical variations are found in the RSL, the results show that the vertical profiles of mean wind speed, streamwise and vertical fluctuating velocity together with momentum flux are comparable between WT and LES. Unlike the linear decrease of momentum flux with increasing height over idealized urban surfaces, significant vertical changes of momentum flux are found in the RSL in both WT and LES, indicating that modification of momentum flux parameterization over real urban surfaces is needed. High-speed, downward flows are observed in the RSL compared with low-speed, upward flows in ISL. Quadrant-hole analysis shows that the wakes after high-rise buildings could significantly affect Q2 and Q4 events that enlarge the turbulence motion scales. These results could help in-depth understanding of the difference in flow structure of ISL and RSL, as well as formulate the implications to CFD validation.

Field Measurements of Wind Microclimate at the Vehicle Level on a Bridge Deck under Typical Canyon Terrain

The wind field characteristics of a bridge site are the key issues for driving the safety assessment condition of mountain canyon terrain. Field measurements on a bridge deck were conducted to investigate the microclimate wind environment at the vehicle level. The measurement points were arranged in the midspan and bridge tower regions along the bridge at vehicle height above the bridge deck. The height-dependent characteristics of the microclimate wind environment at the midspan and bridge tower regions were extensively analyzed. The results show that the mean wind profiles at midspan approximately confirm the power exponential distribution. However, the mean wind profiles show non-power-exponential distribution at the tower regions. The vertical mean wind speed profiles at the midspan and bridge tower regions were then statistically fitted and suggested. The wind speed distribution at the bridge tower regions showed obvious shielding or acceleration effects. Therefore, a typical wind envelope curve across the tower region was proposed along the driving direction. For the turbulence characteristics, turbulence intensities at the tower regions are larger than those at the midspan, and integral scales at the tower regions are smaller than those at the midspan. In this study, a double logarithm third polynomial was recommended to depict the energy distribution of the turbulence microclimate wind in the frequency domain instead of the commonly used empirical spectrum functions. Gust wind speeds were also discussed, and showed that gust wind speeds are more reasonable for evaluating vehicle driving safety and comfort in long-span bridges, especially at the tower regions.

Multi-input model uncertainty analysis for long-range wind farm noise predictions

One of the major sources of uncertainty in predictions of wind farm noise (WFN) reflect parametric and model structure uncertainty. The model structure uncertainty is a systematic uncertainty, which relates to uncertainty about the appropriate mathematical structure of the models. Here we quantified the model structure uncertainty in predicting WFN arising from multi-input models, including nine ground impedance and four wind speed profile models. We used a numerical ray tracing sound propagation model for predicting the noise level at different receivers. We found that variations between different ground impedance models and wind speed profile models were significant sources of uncertainty, and that these sources contributed to predicted noise level differences in excess of 10 dBA at distances greater than 3.5 km. We also found that differences between atmospheric vertical wind speed profile models were the main source of uncertainty in predicting WFN at long-range distances. When predicting WFN, it is important to acknowledge variability associated with different models as this contributes to the uncertainty of the predicted values.

A large-scale, long-term experimental campaign for the investigation of wind turbine noise fluctuations and amplitude modulation phenomena.

The understanding and prediction of wind turbine noise (WTN) remain a subject on which progress is needed to better address the concerns of residents of some wind farms and to help wind farm operators to better optimize their wind farms. A large-scale and long-term measurement campaign was conducted by partners of the PIBE project (https://www.anr-pibe.com/en) near a French wind farm during 430 days, in order to study the emission and propagation of WTN. The campaign provided 100ms sound levels and acoustic spectra, together with periodically recorded 2 min audio samples, at 5 locations ranging from 350m to 1.3km from the wind farm, in different propagation directions. Meteorological data were simultaneously collected by a 80m meteorological mast, one or two Lidars and sonic anemometers, in order to characterize vertical profiles of wind speed, wind direction, temperature, and wind turbulence. 2 distinct weeks of intensive measurements (one in summer and one in winter) completed the data by including 15 additional acoustic points at other locations. The database will mainly be used within the project for the investigation of an uncertainty model of WTN, and of WTN amplitude modulations. This communication presents the database and first results about temporal variabilities of WTN.

Wind characteristics in typhoon boundary layer at coastal areas observed via a Lidar profiler

Information about typhoon wind characteristics provides a basis and is a prerequisite for conducting anti-typhoon studies and practices. Despite the great efforts and active exploration made in the field of typhoon measurements using various equipment over the past decades, how to effectively obtain both the mean and fluctuating components of typhoon wind especially within the atmospheric boundary layer around the inner region of the storm still remains as a challenge. In recent years, Lidar wind profilers have been attracting increasing attention and showing great promise owing to their advantages, such as wide detection range, high sampling frequency, handiness, and flexible layout. However, the results for turbulent wind components using Lidar wind profilers tend to be biased due to the intrinsic spatial average in remote sensing detection. In view of the above, this paper explores the use of the Lidar wind profiler to conduct legitimate measurements of typhoon averages and fluctuating wind field characteristics. Firstly, wind field measurements in the inner regions of two typhoons were successfully captured during their passage with the flexible deployment of equipment in coastal areas. Based on the data obtained, the mean wind field characteristics of the typhoons were examined during different transitional stages and under different exposure conditions, with a focus on the influence of inner boundary layer on the vertical wind speed profile and its key parameters, such as surface roughness and zero-plane displacement. A method based on a wind spectrum model is proposed to correct the typical fluctuating wind field parameters, which include turbulence integral length scale, turbulence intensity, and gust factor. The difference between these wind turbulence parameters before and after the correction was significant, but the corrected results were in better agreement with similar existing results, reflecting the necessity and validity of the correction work. The presented results are expected to be helpful for further understanding of the wind characteristics in the middle and upper portions of typhoon boundary layer, and contribute to the development of using Lidar profiler for observing wind turbulence.

Site- and building height-dependent design extreme wind speed vertical profile of tropical cyclone

Tropical cyclone (TC) wind is one of the dominant loadings in the design of building structures. The radial distance-dependent vertical profile and prominent jet structure or super gradient of TC winds make the conventional terrain-dependent design profile inadequate for describing TC wind loadings along the height. Herein, a stochastic simulation-based algorithm is developed to determine the design extreme wind speed vertical profile of TC using a quasi-3D TC wind field model. The wind field model is first described and validated by comparing the vertical wind speed profiles with the upper-level dropsonde data and lower-level tower observation results. The evolution of the wind profile during the passage of historical real storms is reproduced by introducing optimal fitting results for the wind field parameters. Ten-thousand-year synthetic tracks are simulated to obtain the design extreme wind speeds for several coastal cities. The design extreme wind speed composite profile and structure height-dependent outer envelope profile (OEP) are proposed, which are applicable to a certain height of interest and buildings with different heights, respectively. These profiles also depend on terrain exposure, return period, and location of the site of interest. The code-suggested profiles are confirmed to underestimate the TC-induced wind loadings along the height, especially at sites with lower roughness lengths. The power law profile is still applicable, but larger power coefficients should be utilized, and the design extreme wind speed at 10m should be increased with an increase in the structure height. This study provides a forward step towards the rational estimation of TC-induced wind loadings for high-rise structures. • The radial distance-dependent vertical profile and prominent jet structure of tropical cyclone winds are reproduced. • The design extreme wind speed composite profile and structure height-dependent outer envelope profile (OEP) for tropical cyclone are proposed. • The inadequacy of current code-suggested wind speed vertical profiles to tropical cyclone winds is discussed. • The design extreme wind speed vertical profiles of tropical cyclone in several coastal cities are developed.

Response of sea surface heat fluxes to the South China Sea summer monsoon onset in 2021

By using the ship-based data collected over the South China Sea during the South China Sea summer monsoon (SCSSM) in 2021, the characteristics of near-surface meteorological conditions, surface heat budget, and atmospheric boundary layer structure are analyzed. We found that near-surface air temperature (relative humidity) decreased significantly during the developed monsoon period, while near-surface wind speed showed an obvious increase trend from the pre-monsoon period to the developed monsoon period. The significant reduction of solar radiation due to cloud cover led to the reverse of oceanic heat flux direction from downward to upward. The sea surface sensible and latent heat fluxes were restrained after the SCSSM onset. The atmospheric boundary layer height presented a positive (negative) correlation with near-surface air temperature (humidity). In addition, the vertical profiles of wind speed, virtual potential temperature, and air humidity revealed that: after monsoon onset, (i) the atmospheric circulation within the atmospheric boundary layer accelerated, with a strong low-level jet located below 500-m height; (ii) there was a strong inversion layer below 500-m height, especially at 1300 and 1900 local time (LT); (iii) the atmospheric humidity in low-level raised significantly.

355-nm direct-detection Doppler wind lidar for vertical atmospheric motion measurement.

A compact and simple 355-nm direct-detection Doppler wind lidar (DDDWL) was developed to measure the line-of-sight (LOS) wind speed of the background atmosphere from atmospheric molecule return signals with and without aerosols and clouds. A receiver design with a Fabry-Perot etalon interferometer (FPEI) without an inside deposited step coating or fiber coupling is considered for the DDDWL using the double-edge technique. The receiver with the double-edge technique uses a FPEI and wedge prism to form a double-edge filter. The development of the double-edge filter in this combination is, to the best of our knowledge, an improvement at 355-nm wavelength. Considerations for the DDDWL receiver with a FPEI revealed that a full-angle light beam divergence into the FPEI and a working FPEI aperture are significant factors for the receiver design. Preliminary experimental evaluation demonstrated that the DDDWL had the potential of LOS wind speed measurements with a random error of less than 1 m/s when the signal-to-noise ratio was approximately 300. The DDDWL-measured vertical LOS wind speed profile was consistent with that of a 2-µm coherent Doppler wind lidar within the measurement error range. The preliminary experimental LOS wind measurement results demonstrated the capability of the DDDWL to measure low LOS wind speeds.

Analytical model of fully developed wind farms in conventionally neutral atmospheric boundary layers

The wind energy industry relies on computationally efficient engineering-type models to design wind farms. Typically these models do not account for the effect of atmospheric stratification in either the boundary layer or the free atmosphere. This study proposes a new analytical model for fully developed wind-turbine arrays in conventionally neutral atmospheric boundary layers frequently encountered in nature. The model captures the effect of the free-atmosphere stratification, Coriolis force, wind farm layout and turbine operating condition on the wind farm performance. The model is developed based on the physical insight derived from large-eddy simulations. We demonstrate that the geostrophic drag law (GDL) for flow over flat terrain can be extended to flow over fully developed wind farm arrays. The presence of a vast wind farm significantly increases the wind farm friction velocity compared with flow over flat terrain, which is modelled by updated coefficients in the GDL. The developed model reliably captures the vertical wind speed profile inside the wind farm. Furthermore, the power production trends observed in simulations are reliably reproduced. The wind farm performance, normalized by the geostrophic wind speed, decreases as the free-atmosphere thermal stability increases or the Coriolis force decreases. In addition, we find that the optimal wind farm performance is obtained at a lower thrust coefficient than the Betz limit, which indicates that optimal operating conditions for turbines in a wind farm are different than for a single turbine.

Vertical wind speed extrapolation model using long short‐term memory and particle swarm optimization

AbstractInvestigating the potential for deploying a wind farm requires accurate knowledge of the vertical profile of wind speed (WS), both temporal and with height. Commonly, WS estimations at different heights involves calculating site‐dependent parameters such as roughness length, atmospheric conditions, and wind shear coefficient. This study proposes a hybrid model to estimate WS at different heights based on measurements at lower heights using particle swarm optimization and long short‐term memory (PSO‐LSTM). The training procedure consists of two steps, namely the Levenberg–Marquardt (LM) and the PSO, to minimize the mean squared error. To perform vertical extrapolation, the PSO‐LSTM utilizes the measured WS at 10‐40 m heights to predict WS at 50 m. The predicted results at 50 m are then utilized along with the measured WS at 10–40 to extrapolate WS to 60 m. This process continues until the extrapolation of WS at 120 m is made. The PSO is compared with other optimization methods like genetic algorithm (GA), tuna swarm optimization (TSO), grey wolf optimization (GWO), sparrow search algorithm (SSA), and bald eagle search (BES) on improving the LSTM accuracy. The performance of the PSO‐LSTM is compared with the standard LSTM, feedforward neural network and the logarithmic law (LogLaw) based estimation. The extrapolated values obtained using these methods are compared with LiDAR system‐based measurements. The proposed method outperformed the other methods.

Urban ventilation assessment with improved vertical wind profile in high-density cities – Comparisons between LiDAR and conventional methods

The vertical wind speed profile is crucial to urban ventilation assessment and urban planning/design. This study uses Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) observation as benchmark to evaluate accuracy of wind profiles estimated by conventional methods. The conventional methods include Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel (BLWT), Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS), Power Law (PL), and Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF). The evaluation involves two typical urban sites with different densities under summer weak-wind conditions. Large Eddie Simulations (LES) are conducted to further investigate the sensitivity of urban ventilation assessment results to the deviations of wind profiles. The results indicate significant deviations in LES caused by conventional methods. The largest deviations of wind velocity ratio are found in mesoscale meteorological models (RAMS and WRF (>65%)). Deviations caused by physical and empirical models are smaller but still significant (BLWT (>25%) and PL (>40%)). Consequently, large deviations (>100%) of wind-relevant criterion for outdoor thermal comfort are observed. Finally, to balance accuracy and data availability, we recommend power law method as the optimal method to provide inflow boundary condition for numerical simulations when LiDAR observation is not available. We provide new and valuable understandings to improve urban ventilation assessment in high-density cities.