Professor Bill Leithead is Head of the Wind Energy and Control Centre in the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering at the University of Strathclyde. He is Director of the EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council) Centre for Doctoral Training in Wind and Marine Energy Systems and its successor, the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Wind and Marine Energy Systems and Structures, which has an annual intake of 16 PhD students. He was, also, Chair of the EPSRC Supergen Wind Hub from 2006 to 2019. Prof. Leithead is a member of the European Energy Research Alliance Joint Programme Wind Steering Committee, the European Academy of Wind Energy Executive Committee, the Scientific Advisory Board of the Norwegian Centre for Offshore Wind Technology (Trondheim) and is the Deputy Chair of the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult Research Advisory Group.
 
Prof. Leithead has been conducting research into Wind Energy since 1988 when he founded the wind energy research group at University of Strathclyde. Its compliment is now approximately 10 academic staff and 60+ PhD students and Research Associates. His research interests include the design of wind turbines, the modelling and simulation of wind turbines and wind farms, and the dynamic analysis and control of wind turbines and wind farms. He has strong links to all aspects of the Wind Energy industry and has been involved in many collaborative projects related to the design of controllers and wind turbines. Prof. Leithead has been the recipient of more than 65 research grants and is the author of more than 250 academic publications.

Meeting the UK’s Offshore Wind Challenge for 2050  

Abstract

The UK Government has set targets for offshore wind of 40GW by 2030 and 70GW by 2050. Since peak UK demand for electrical power is currently roughly 60GW, the implication, should these targets be achieved, is that at times supply will exceed demand for significant periods. Consequently, to prevent upward pressure on the cost of energy, the ways in which wind power is utilised will need to change radically from those of today, particularly as the largest variation in demand is between Summer and Winter. Flexible operation of turbines and farms will be required with offshore assets operated in a fully integrated systems level manner. A brief overview of the research being conducted in the Wind Energy and Control Group to address this challenge will be presented.