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52 L. de Santoli et al. / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments 8 (2014) 42–56
Table 11
Geographical characteristics of the case study area and the nearest meteorological station in Trapani Birgi.
Favignana island Latitude (°) Longitude (°) Altitude (m) Distance from Favignana island (km)
Trapani Birgi
37.93 12.31 7 –
37.92 15.5 7 10
Fig. 15. Estimation of the hour per year and wind speed distribution in Favignana island.
Fig. 16. Wind direction frequency in Favignana island. In order to evaluate the potential environmental impacts of the
AM300 prototype on natural protected areas, a preliminary envi-
Environment underlined the potential application of micro wind ronmental analysis, was carry out. Generally, the environmental
turbines in natural protected areas for satisfying the growing impact assessment of a micro wind turbine is elaborated using
energy needs within the Italian parks (which constitute about the LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) methodology [65–70]. In this case,
10% of the national territory), with particular regard to the poten- since this is a preliminary analysis, the aim was focused on gather-
tial application of the micro wind in the small Italian islands [64]. ing the main data in the literature, and consequentially on the pre-
sentation of the first considerations. The energy analysis was
carried out simulating the installation of the AM300 prototype in
the Favignana island, a small protected island near Sicily. The con-
sidered solution was an off-grid system that could assure a daily
electric energy amount for the houses of the inland areas of the
island. After evaluating the wind speed characteristics of the area
and the relative energy outputs, a CO2 emissions was developed.
Wind speed characteristics
The case study area, situated in the south of Italy, in front of the
city of Trapani (Sicily), is characterized by constant wind all year
long. The Favignana island is characterized by low values of wind
speed, but the orientation and the wind speed values are generally
constant during the year. In this framework, the prototype pro-
posed, thanks to its technical characteristics, offers good prospec-
tive to produce electric energy. Table 11 reports the geographical
characteristics of the case study area and the nearest meteorolog-
ical station, in Trapani Birgi.
The frequency distribution of wind in Favignana island
(Fig. 15) was produced by meteorological simulation obtained by
