Preliminary Assessment of Climate Change Impacts on the UK Onshore Wind Energy Resource

Abstract

Wind power is currently the fastest growing renewable technology and will play a significant role in constraining the extent of climate change. However, the very fact that its ‘fuel source’ is driven by the climate may leave it exposed as climate changes over the coming decades. In this preliminary assessment, the potential for changes in climate to affect the significant onshore wind resource in the United Kingdom (UK) is explored using the regional climate change scenarios published by the UK Climate Impacts Programme in 2002. The scenarios indicate seasonal changes in potential wind production with winter production generally increasing while summer decreases.

Keywords:

• climate change
• United Kingdom
• wind climate
• wind energy

Acknowledgments

Lucy Cradden gratefully acknowledges the support of the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council via a PhD studentship.

The authors acknowledge the support of the Scottish Funding Council for the Joint Research Institute with Heriot-Watt University, which is a part of the Edinburgh Research Partnership.

The UKCIP02 Climate Scenario data have been made available by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). DEFRA accepts no responsibility for any inaccuracies or omissions in the data, nor for any loss or damage directly or indirectly caused to any person by reason of, or arising out of any use of, this data. © Crown Copyright 2002.