In this article, we give an overview of the latest additions to the Youwind IT Platform:
- The possibility of adding a shunt reactor to improve the efficiency of AC export transmission
- Ability to fix the rotation angle of the wind park layout
- Improvements in the financial overview of your Scenario
- Scenario workflow overview and notifications
- Commenting and tagging
- Share the VMS link and ESRI to the GIS folder
- Updated wind areas in Greece and Portugal used for the public consultation process
- Floating wind budget in 2023
As always, you can write to info@youwindrenewables.com to get further information or help from our offshore wind experts.
Extension of AC transmission modeling with a shunt reactor
When you are using an AC high-voltage transmission in your offshore wind park scenario, you can now add shunt reactors on your offshore substations.
You can do this by using the checkbox Use a shunt reactor on the offshore substation. The reactive power MVAr capacity of the shunt reactor is automatically chosen to maximize the efficiency of the export transmission. You can inspect the resulting Total shunt reactor capacity (MVAr) in the Export Cable assumptions, and the improved Export Cable Efficiency (%) in the Efficiency and Availability table.
The effect of using a shunt reactor will be more significant for AC transmissions covering a longer distance, i.e. when the wind park is further away from the onshore substation.
The pricing of the shunt reactor is set at the Offshore substation library item, where you can define the cost function based on the reactor's rated reactive power capacity (MVAr).
The resulting cost of the shunt reactor is included in the CAPEX budget of the scenario, as a subcategory of the Offshore substation cost.
This feature was made in collaboration with CITCEA-UPC and IREC, with the funding support of Innotec, a funding line of ACCIÓ to promote innovative projects, from the Generalitat de Catalunya.
Set the rotation angle of the wind park layout
Normally, the Generate Layout feature in the Park Layout Design tab optimizes the rotation angle of the wind turbine rows in order to minimize wake losses. However, for some projects, this orientation angle may be a given in order to for example allow ship navigation through the park.Therefore, now you can choose to fix the rotation angle by switching off the checkbox Optimize orientation angle of the park layout and specifying the angle of the row with major spacing.
Improvements in financial overview
Now under financial, you can set your own payment schedule after FID. This means that you can now adapt the payments and decide how discounting and inflation affect the business case.
Under real year you choose the year when the budget is made. The FID year determines the inflation that is added on top of the chosen real year.
Under development time (years) the payment schedule is automatically set. If you choose 6 years you can split the DEVEX and CAPEX payments over the time of development, procurement, construction, and commissioning.
This is reflected directly in the overview of the project and when the operation starts.
If you choose FID as 2023 and 6 years of development and construction time, the COD (Commercial Operation Date) is set at 2029.
Scenario workflow overview and notifications
Inside the tab Scenario Overview and Finance you can now find this overview:
This gives you an overview of where you are in the process of the scenario design. Going from area screening to park layout design you can then see if the neighboring wind farms are accounted for or if a wind temporal analysis has been performed.
Commenting and tagging
Inside comments for each library item you can now write a comment and tag your college or client. When doing so the tagged person gets an email straight and a red info sign in the top right corner.
The list of the users can be found under company/users.
To tag someone you simply write @ and the list of users shows in a drop-down.
Once promped with a tag the user gets an email notification with a link to the comment.
VMS and ESRI links in the GIS layers
Youwind is now integrated with web map service (WMS) compatibility. You can now integrate from any source directly to your scenario and continue working on project analysis. Adding the WMS is simple and safe and to use it is simple. You simply paste the VMS link in the URL as shown below.
If you are using ArcGIS you can also generate an ESRI link that can be used the same way.
Which then are visible directly in area screening under GIS layers.
Updated wind farm areas in Greece and Portugal for the public consultation process
This month Youwind has been updated with the latest offshore wind areas in Greece and Portugal that have opened up the process of public consultation.
In Portugal, the government has set the capacity on offer in the auction to be launched by year-end at 2 GW in three areas off the country's Atlantic coast.
Greece is aiming to build an installed capacity of at least 2 gigawatts from offshore wind by 2030, representing one-tenth of its onshore capacity. The draft plan includes 25 eligible development areas in the Aegean, Ionian, and Mediterranean seas that will become available in two time periods, some between 2025 and as late as 2032.
The updated zones can be added to your scenario under GIS layers where you can search for Portugal or Greece.
Updated floating costs in Real 2023
We have re-analyzed the floating wind farm costs per library item and issued an updated budget in Real 2023 terms for all floating library items. Evaluation has been made using the latest market releases and inflation over the last two years on materials. New library items with the name "Floating" have been released for the subscribers.
For turbines and floating platforms, the installation time and costs have also been revised.
Note that the cost differs when changing the site details, such as bathymetry, soil conditions, and distance to the onshore grid point.
This applies to the following library items:
Turbines
Array cables
Operations and Maintenance
About Youwind Renewables
Youwind is the leading web-based engineering application for offshore wind.
The highly flexible application models the complete engineering and financial project lifecycle of your Offshore Wind projects and optimizes your workflow. Youwind is made by offshore wind experts for professionals in the field.
Its collaborative and integrative approach allows projects to be analyzed and executed more efficiently and reliably. Our solutions empower project developers, suppliers, and investors to make reliable decisions more efficiently without losing accuracy.
Try out all the Youwind functions on the Youwind IT Platform.
