04/15/2021

Global Wind Atlas 3.1 released

The Global Wind Atlas version 3.1 includes several new features and improvements. All visual layers on the Global Wind Atlas have become user-scaleable and the new bathymetry layer makes it possible to quickly assess the water depth for offshore wind turbines and wind farms.

Image: DTU Wind Energy

Today, DTU Wind Energy has released the Global Wind Atlas (GWA) version 3.1. This new version of the free and web-based application represents a significant upgrade. As such, the GWA continues to help policymakers, planners and investors identify global, national, regional and local high-wind areas for wind power generation. DTU would like to acknowledge the funding provided by ESMAP, as well as advice and review provided by staff and consultants from the World Bank.

In GWA 3.1, DTU Wind Energy and Nazka Mapps introduce an important improvement, which facilitates that all visual layers on the GWA have become user-scaleable. So now, the users are able to choose between different color scales and set minimum and maximum values for each map.

GWA users who are interested in offshore wind resources will appreciate the new “bathymetry” layer, which includes negative elevation for seabed bathymetry, drawing on data provided by the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO). This makes it possible to quickly assess the water depth for offshore wind turbines and wind farms.

In the “countries and regions” section, a link has been included to the results of the World Bank Group’s analysis of offshore wind technical potential for emerging markets around the world. These maps show the estimated technical potential for fixed and floating offshore wind in in terms of installed power capacity, within 200 kilometers of the shoreline.

Engineers and researchers will appreciate that orography, Weibull-A and Weibull-k layers have been added to the existing GIS download feature by country.

In addition, a series of smaller improvements have been made to the web interface, including a ruler to measure distances, an improved management for uploading/downloading/saving custom areas and an improved download section where you can download plot data, GIS data, printed maps and country reports.

Finally, DTU Wind Energy has carried out additional validation of the GWA 3 dataset. This is an ongoing task that uses data from ESMAP-funded measurement campaigns and other public high-quality wind data. With this release, validation has been performed using data from ESMAP-funded measurement campaigns implemented by the World Bank in Bangladesh and the Maldives.

The Global Wind Atlas is developed, owned and operated by DTU, Technical University of Denmark. DTU wishes to thank all organizations and individuals involved in the development of the GWA 3.1, including those not listed above, who have provided important input data, advice, review, and feedback.