Wind power is essential for a sustainable future. By 2050, half of Europe's electricity should come from wind, requiring a 25-fold increase. This growth depends on building new wind farms and extending the life of existing ones, which are threatened by unpredictable lightning, especially upward lightning. 

The Lightning Risk for Wind Power project aimed to improve the understanding of rare upward lightning events on tall structures such as wind turbines. Since a significant proportion of upward lightning is not detected by the local lightning detection system, this project aimed to address the lack of data on upward lightning. Combining ground-truth lightning current measurements at the Gaisberg Tower (Austria) and the Saentis Tower (Switzerland) with comprehensive meteorological reanalysis data, machine learning could  successfully improve the assessment of spatio-seasonal upward lightning risk in the Eastern Alps and its surroundings.

Georg Mayr

Isabell Stucke

Achim Zeileis (Department of Statistics, UIBK), Gerhardt Diendorfer, Wolfgang Schulz, Hannes Pichler

Austrian Climate Research Program – Implementations. Grant Number: KC305650

01.10.2023 to 30.04.2024

Isabell Stucke, Deborah Morgenstern, Gerhard Diendorfer, et al. Spatio-seasonal risk assessment of upward lightning at tall objects using meteorological reanalysis data. ESS Open Archive . April 16, 2024. 
DOI: 10.22541/essoar.171322767.78278045/v1