Global assessment of high-altitude wind power

Abstract

The available wind power resource worldwide at altitudes between 500 and 12,000 m above ground is assessed for the first time. Twenty-eight years of wind data from the reanalyses by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction and the Department of Energy are analyzed and interpolated to study geographical distributions and persistency of winds at all altitudes. Furthermore, intermittency issues and global climate effects of largescale extraction of energy from high-altitude winds are investigated. © 2009 by the authors; licensee Molecular Diversity Preservation International, Basel, Switzerland.