Evaluating the viability of wind energy projects: A case-based approach

Wind energy generation showed an impressive development in the last years due to its mature and reliable technology characterized by lower investment costs if compared with other RESs. The present case study proposes the feasibility study of a wind turbine of 3.4MW operating for a period of 20years. The objective of the case study is to show how to develop a simple feasibility study which includes the energy and financial calculations. Two approaches are illustrated for the energy calculations: one based on the hourly distribution of wind speed data for 1year and another one based on the availability of only average wind velocity and standard deviation which considers the Weibull approach to estimate the wind velocity frequency. Once that the energy generated by the wind turbine is estimated, a simple procedure to assess the financial feasibility through the Net Present Value calculation is shown.