WAsP Engineering (WEng)

• Extreme wind speeds, e.g. the 50-year wind. If a wind turbine is well situated on a hill the mean wind speed and thereby the power production can be increased significantly compared to that over flat terrain. Unfortunately, the 50-year wind will increase correspondingly, maybe calling for increased strength of the blades or other parts of the turbine.
• Wind shears and wind profiles. Strong mean wind shears (large differences in the mean wind speed over the rotor) give large fluctuating loads and consequently fatigue on the wind turbine blades, because the blades move through areas of varying wind speed.
• Turbulence. Turbulence (gusts of all sizes and shapes) causes dynamic loads on various civil engineering structures, including wind turbines. The strength of the turbulence varies from place to place. Over land the turbulence is more intense than over the sea. Also the hills affect the structure of turbulence. We model various terrain dependent properties of turbulence.

WAsP Engineering version 1.0 was launched at the 2001 European Wind Energy Conference and Exhibition in Copenhagen.  A report on the WAsP Engineering project may be downloaded here. The report contains a complete description of the turbulence modelling in moderately complex terrain, implemented in WAsP Engineering. Also experimental validation of the model together with comparison with spectra from engineering codes is done.

WAsP Engineering 3
We are proud to announce that WAsP Engineering 3 has now been launched, introducing a number of improvements and new features. Please visit the web-page What is new in WaspEngineering 3 for details.  

The WAsP Engineering software package

The WAsP Engineering 3 software package consists of three Microsoft installer files: the WAsP Engineering program, the WAsP Climate Analyst and the WAsP Map Editor. The installation files may be downloaded from the software download page. Scripts are found at the script download page. In addition, the package contains the Windfarm Assessment Tool (WAT), a set of sample data files and several demonstration projects. Documentation is included as on-line help files. You will find the software package at the WAsP Engineering 3 download page. 


The Windfarm Assessment Tool (WAT) is better integrated in WEng 3. The WAT input are produced by WEng and WAsP in collaboration. This is now done by a built-in tool replacing the previous scripting method. You will need an upgrade to WAsP 10 to run the new WAT launcher tool.


Further reading:

• Comparison of WASP and WAsP Engineering
• WAsP Engineering spatial view
• WAsP Engineering site view 
• WAsP Engineering transect view
• WAsP Engineering extreme winds
• Extreme Wind Atlases by NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data
• The stand-alone IEC turbulence simulator