Science Magazine October 25, 2019
Wind energy is already playing a role as a mainstream source of electricity, driven by decades of scientific discovery and technology development. An international team of researchers (USA – NERL, University of Colorado, UMASS Amherst, NOAA, Johns Hopkins University, University of Wyoming, Sandia National Laboratory, industry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Spain, Norway) reviews the challenges and opportunities for further expanding wind technology, with an emphasis on the need for interdisciplinary collaboration. They identified three grand challenges in wind energy research that require further progress from the scientific community: (i) improved understanding of the physics of atmospheric flow in the critical zone of wind power plant operation, (ii) materials and system dynamics of individual wind turbines, and (iii) optimization and control of fleets of wind plants comprising hundreds of individual generators working synergistically within the larger electric grid system. These grand challenges are interrelated, so progress in each domain must build on concurrent advances in the other two…read more.