Study and design of a portable weather station to assess wind energy potential at Tlemcen’s Faculty of Technology

Small-scale wind energy applications have shown great promise in terms of their potential contribution in the transition to a low-carbon economy. However, the potential of energy production of these wind turbines at the level of the building has not yet been fully exploited due to the complexities of turbulent urban winds and the challenges the latter creates towards the development of effective scoping tools for viability assessments. This project deals with the process of setting up a local, portable weather station to collect meteorological data, on the basis that grant the possibility to make recommendations for a selection of a small, low-power wind turbine, using data collected over a minimum of $\mathbf{1 2}$ months. A method of obtaining wind speed and data direction has been implemented, and a methodology taken from has been considered for processing this data in order to assess the wind energy potential for a chosen site. To obtain, collect and convert this data, the Arduino microcontroller and appropriate measurement devices have been used. The feasibility of integrating renewable energy sources such as wind power into a consumer’s energy system can be assessed using this portable station. Due to this portable weather station, the availability of the measured data was very high, exceeding the required minimum value of $\mathbf{9 0 \%}$. It was found that the study area we selected did not have enough wind potential to economically justify the installation of a large or small wind turbine. In fact, wind turbines do not reach their nominal productivity due to very low wind speeds (up to 2 $\mathrm{m} / \mathrm{s}$) at our site. In addition, a high proportion of atmospheric calm was observed. This is an important advantage of using portable weather stations, as they provide accurate information about the area under study.