Economic study of the wind energy potential in Sahel
Résumé
The wind pattern in Sahel is marked by a strong diurnal cycle as well as a strong seasonal cycle. The low level jet is blowing above the near-surface layer during nighttime and is decoupled from the surface. Nowadays, some studies showed the possibility to use the sub-jet wind at levels higher than 90 m as a source of energy in this area. In the present work, the wind turbines, with hub heights situated at 150 m and blade extremities at 150 ± 60 m, were used to make an economic study of wind energy potential in Sahel. Thus, monthly wind power was determined by two methods. The first involved the wind distributions directly observed. The second was based on the Weibull distributions which were fitted to the data. Day and night were compared. Results showed that this jet was an attractive source of energy provided if huge-capacity energy storage was used. So, the energy stored at night could be restored during the daytime, when the demand is highest. An economic study was done to estimate the number of wind turbines needed to satisfy the Niamey demand. The cost was found reasonably cheap relative to that of other renewable energy sources.
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