Burchill Wind to power reliable clean energy supply in region, study shows
Dalhousie University research shows Saint John’s new wind farm will be highly energy productive and can provide power at peak times while complementing other wind energy sites in Atlantic Canada.
By Dr. Lukas Swan, Director of Dalhousie University's Renewable Energy Storage Laboratory, January 13, 2022
Natural Forces is now actively building Burchill Wind, a wind farm project it is undertaking to supply Saint John Energy. This project stands to deliver more than just renewable energy, it will benefit Saint John and others by providing power at key times, largely due to its strategic location along the Bay of Fundy.
Allow me to explain.
Our team here at Dalhousie University's Renewable Energy Storage Laboratory has the principal objective of fostering the development of reliable, efficient, and effective electricity systems, typically renewable energy (wind, solar, tidal) and energy storage (e.g. batteries). We also work with industry and public-sector partners to provide unbiased, third-party modelling and experimental evaluations of projects.
Independent evaluation
Our team was asked to evaluate the Burchill Wind Project, including its projected impact on local power demand and exports of surplus electricity back to the provincial power grid. Once fully operational in 2023, the wind farm will operate 10 turbines along the Fundy coast at the Spruce Lake Industrial Park in Saint John to provide a peak of 42 megawatts of power.
In our evaluation of Burchill, we looked at 1.5 years of measured wind speed data logged by scientific instruments located at the Burchill Wind Project site. The project will use large turbines (4.2 megawatts each) mounted on tall towers 131 metres high. When combined with strong winds along the Bay of Fundy, it gives the project the scale to achieve capacity factors in excess of 50 per cent, which is above most other projects throughout the Atlantic provinces. (Capacity factor is a metric of energy productivity of a wind turbine.)
Complementary generation
“Combined with strong winds along the Bay of Fundy, there is scale to achieve capacity factors above most other projects throughout the Atlantic provinces.”
We also investigated how the Burchill site correlates in time to other wind farms in New Brunswick and other Atlantic provinces. Ideally, a new wind farm should be located where it will be producing more power when other wind farms are not, and it should produce less power when other farms are producing a lot. This ensures that renewable electricity is more consistent on the regional electrical grid.
Because Saint John is buffeted by offshore winds moving up the Bay of Fundy, there is a difference between when the wind is blowing hardest at the Burchill site and when it reaches wind farms further inland. This is complementary and is desirable when siting new wind farms.
Peak power at peak demand
Our timestep modelling combined the measured wind data with the wind turbine power curve specification to investigate if the wind farm would produce electricity at key load periods, such as cold winter mornings or nights. When wind engineers speak of “capacity value,” we’re talking about wind farms producing electricity when it is needed most. To do this, we compared with measured electricity load data from Saint John Energy.
“The Burchill Wind Project is more productive as it gets colder.”
Our analysis found a correlation that the wind at Burchill blows stronger as the air temperature drops. This is good news for Saint John and New Brunswick, because it means that the Burchill Wind Project is more productive as it gets colder. This, at times, will reduce the need for the more expensive power and the use of carbon-emitting fossil fuel-fired generation stations to meet the winter peak load. Consequently, the Burchill Wind Farm is a significant development both for the environment in New Brunswick and the costs to supply power on high load days.
By John Dalton, President of Power Advisory LLC, November 23, 2021
For example, our model shows that if Burchill was operating with all turbines during the peak New Brunswick load day in 2020 (Feb. 21), it would have been producing between 20 and 35 megawatts in the preceding hour, during the peak, and the following hour.
To conclude, our findings demonstrate that Burchill:
Will be a high energy productivity wind farm;
Is strategically located to complement other regional wind farms;
Produces electricity during periods of peak load.
Dr. Lukas Swan, PEng., an energy storage engineer with 20 years of experience, is Director of Dalhousie University's Renewable Energy Storage Laboratory. The lab conducts research on energy storage technologies to support the increased integration of renewable energy with the Maritime electricity grid.