A Copula Model of Wind Turbine Performance

Abstract

The conventional means of assessing the performance of a wind turbine is through consideration of its power curve which provides the relationship between power output and measured wind speed. In this letter, it is shown how the joint probability distribution of power and wind speed can be learned from data, rather than from examination of the implied function of the two variables. Such an approach incorporates measures of uncertainty into performance estimates, allows inter-plant performance comparison, and could be used to simulate plant operation via sampling. A preliminary model is formulated and fitted to operational data as an illustration.