Abstract: Wind power has been harnessed for commercial electricity generation for more than three decades. Notwithstanding its maturity, the wind energy industry is still evolving. Wind turbines are steadily growing in size and complexity, and wind power plants are constructed on an ever-increasing scale especially offshore. As the industry continues to push the technological boundaries, new scientific and engineering challenges are uncovered.
In this presentation, I will give an account of my personal transition from theoretical atomic physics to industrial R&D for an offshore wind farm developer and operator. The talk will explain the fundamental physics of wind energy and give examples of my work experiences.
Nicolai Nygaard received the Ph.D. in Chemical Physics from the University of Maryland in 2003, for his thesis “Superfluidity in a degenerate atomic Fermi gas,”