Turbine Integrated Mortality Reduction (TIMRSM ) is a smart curtailment technology that uses bat activity and weather data to curtail wind turbines only during high-risk periods as opposed to curtailing based on weather conditions alone.
Developed by our bat biologists and software engineers, our TIMR system for long-term remote monitoring and detection of real time bat activity supports safe and efficient wind power generation—reducing bat fatalities while maintaining maximum energy production during periods when bats are not active.
TIMRSM leverages the real-time capabilities of automated bat detectors and combines it with real-time weather conditions to predict high bat fatalities and communicate the risk values to the client’s Operations Center, allowing for real-time curtailment of turbines. When the risk conditions are no longer high, the turbines will operate normally. In a study conducted at a Wind Energy Facility in Wisconsin, the TIMR system resulted in an 82% reduction in overall bat fatalities and an 87% reduction in Myotis fatalities.
Bat mortality is common at terrestrial wind facilities where bats frequently collide with fast-moving turbine blades. Bat mortality, especially of federally threatened and endangered species, can necessitate mandatory shutdowns and restrict operations during high-risk periods for bats.
TIMRSM is capable of operating under flexible designs in which bat experts create sensor-turbine groups (zones) based on local terrain and recorded or predicted bat behavior. TIMRSM communicates directly with the turbine SCADA system in real-time based on bat presence and weather conditions. If high-risk conditions occur, TIMRSM can signal the SCADA system to shut down just the turbine groups under high-risk conditions, while allowing the low-risk turbine groups to operate normally.
TIMRSM offers significant advantages over other curtailment solutions that reduce bat fatalities. Wind speed only curtailment (aka blanket curtailment), where operational decisions are made based on only wind speed, has greater impacts on energy production because they frequently curtail turbines when bats are not present. Algorithm-based curtailment, where shutdown decisions are made based on a bat activity model, don’t account for bat activity that is not predicted by the model—thereby risking mass mortality events during stochastic behaviors, such as a passing group of migrating bats. The inclusion of real-time bat activity with TIMRSM smart curtailment addresses the limitations of both approaches and offers a more effective bat fatality reduction approach while minimizing energy production losses.
The costs for installing and maintaining a TIMRSM system depend on the bat fatality reduction goals, the size of the wind facility, and number of installed bat detectors. The higher costs of additional sensors can be offset by a more flexible regime reducing power loss even further. Let us know your needs and we will work with you on a custom solution to meet the goals of your project.
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Client: Electric Power Research Institute Project Highlights: Normandeau provided technology for a collaborative study...
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