Presentations

Abstract

As offshore wind clusters in the North Sea grow in size and density, wake interactions between neighbouring wind farms increasingly influence energy production. Most prior studies address axial induction optimisation only within single wind farms, without accounting for interactions between sites or the strategic behaviour of multiple operators. This work presents the first known investigation of induction optimisation across an entire offshore cluster comprising over 3,000 turbines, demonstrating how different decision‑making frameworks (selfish versus collaborative) affect annual energy production (AEP) at scale. A synthetic cluster of 49 offshore wind farms was constructed to represent realistic spatial variation in density, orientation, and inter‑site spacing, including widened corridors to emulate potential shipping lanes. All sites were modelled using generic 15 MW turbines and forced with 2013 North Sea wind conditions to generate representative AEP predictions. Wake interactions were simulated with the TurboPark wake model, and all other losses were intentionally excluded to isolate the impact of the axial induction control. Each site was constrained to operate in one of six discrete axial induction modes, with a uniform mode applied across all turbines within the site. Three operational scenarios were evaluated. In the Baseline case, all sites operated with their standard power curve and no thrust reduction. In the Selfish scenario, each wind farm independently maintained or reduced thrusts to maximise its own AEP, assuming all other sites remained unaltered; these selections were determined through exhaustive search across the six available modes. Finally, in the Collaborative scenario, a cluster‑wide optimisation determined thrust reductions by site that maximised total AEP across all sites. Two optimisation algorithms, a genetic algorithm and a simple iterative search, both converged to the same configuration, giving confidence in the solution found. In this case study, selfish optimisation improved cluster‑wide AEP by ~0.3%, whereas collaborative optimisation nearly doubled the benefit to ~0.6%. While the absolute values will vary across real projects, the relative behaviour (selfish strategies capturing only part of the available gain) is expected to hold across many dense offshore clusters. These gains correspond to significant energy yields given the scale of future offshore clusters.  The results suggest that financial coordination mechanisms between wind farm operators could unlock mutual benefits, even when axial induction control at one site reduces its standalone output. In such arrangements, payments between neighbouring farms could incentivise operation closer to the collaborative optimum, increasing net revenues for all parties. While such mechanisms would present regulatory and contractual challenges, the findings indicate that coordination between developers could play an important role in maximising energy production in future offshore wind clusters.