Scaled Wind Farm Technology Facility

Wind turbine research facility

The Scaled Wind Farm Technology (SWiFT) Facility is a collaborative research facility, located at the Reese Technology Center in Lubbock, Texas.[1] It is the first facility to offer multiple wind turbines to measure turbine performance in a wind farm environment for as a user facility for the Wind Energy Technologies Office of the United States Department of Energy.[2] The project was formally commissioned in summer 2013.[3]

Partners

Some of the present research collaboration is involving the following research partners:[1]

  • Texas Tech University
  • The National Wind Institute
  • Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) for the Wind Energy Technologies Office (WETO) of the U.S. Department of Energy.[4]
  • Vestas, a Danish wind company[5]
  • Group NIRE, which is a renewable energy corporation created in 2010 by Texas Tech.

Facilities

The facilities consist of:[4]

  • SWiFT Wind Turbines: Three research-scale wind turbines (modified Vestas V27s), two deployed by Sandia and the third one by Vesta.
  • Meteorological (MET) Towers: Two 60-meter-tall anemometer towers for measuring wind speed
  • Control Building: Housing 640 square feet of computing space for wind-turbine control.
  • Assembly Building: A 5,500 square foot, environmentally controlled high-bay assembly area with machining capabilities (lathe, multiple mills, drill press, welders, and related items).

References

  1. ^ a b "DOE/SNL Scaled Wind Farm Technology (SWiFT) Facility | National Wind Institute | TTU". www.depts.ttu.edu. Retrieved 2024-06-08.
  2. ^ "Making history in wind studies". LabNews. Retrieved 2024-06-08.
  3. ^ "DOE/SNL Scaled Wind Farm Technology (SWiFT) Facility | National Wind Institute | TTU". www.depts.ttu.edu. Retrieved 2024-06-08.
  4. ^ a b "SWiFT Facility".
  5. ^ "This is Vestas". www.vestas.com. Retrieved 2024-06-08.