| Service Owner and Provider(s) |
GeoSphere (owner for solar energy service), Contacts: Vanessa Seitner, Matthias Schlögl, Energiewerkstatt (owner for wind energy service), Contacts: Alexander Stökl, Andreas Krenn; EOX (provider of hosting platform & support in front end), Contact: Daniel Santillan |
| Abstract Description |
The primary objective of this task is to identify favourable sites for solar and wind energy development. The GTIF-AT service provides a basis for decision-making in terms of signifying areas where the installation of photovoltaic systems and wind turbines could be useful. For solar energy, this information is derived from a high resolution global radiation dataset (APOLIS) and allows user-defined queries. For wind energy, potential, technically suitable areas are derived by combining data on nature conservation areas, existing wind energy zoning by the federal states, high-accuracy settlement structure as well as relevant energy and transport infrastructure. Furthermore, the site specific levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) will be included as a criterion to assess economic viability. |
| Stakeholder(s) |
BMK (Austrian Ministry of Climate Action and Energy), Austrian Ministry of Research and Education (BMBWF), spatial energy planners, general public |
| Point of Contact (POC) |
Bernhard Fürnsinn, Wolfang Jank, BMK; TBC, BMBWF |
| Expectations |
Open Government database, reporting files, and user interface for the documentation of acceleration areas. |
| Input Data |
Solar: DEM Austria, VHR-DSM, APOLIS data set; Wind: data on wind conditions (“wind atlas” see WR-01), orographic and geographic data, cartographic GIS datasets (OSM), Austrian address register, Natura 2000 and Ramsar designated areas, updated register of existing wind power plants, regulations of Austrian federal states |
| Pre-processing |
Solar: Initial creation of a static solar potential layer, algorithm hosted in GTIF workspace on cloud infrastructure; Wind: Layers with stand-off distances for different criteria. Tables and coefficients for LCOE calculation. |
| Run-time |
Solar: Demand for cloud-resources depending on the size of the Area of Interest; Wind: Application and superposition of criteria and parameters for the area of interest.; Algorithms, to be deployed as containers on GTIF/EOxHub and elastic cloud |
| Output Information Product |
Solar: Assessment based on probabilities for potentially unused industrial and commercial areas; Wind: Potentially suitable development areas, calculated for user-defined technical and geographical criteria and parameters. |
| GTIF legacy |
Substitute of GTIF-AT Demonstrator Capabilities “Solar Energy Assessment” and “Wind Energy Assessment” |
| Service outlet, API and/or GUI functions |
Solar and wind potential map of a target region in Austria (COG). Can be queried spatially within a defined area via GTIF-AT front end (interactive WebGIS) to show potential renewable energy development areas for user-defined parameters and criteria. |
| Long-term perspective (governance, sustained operations, funding) |
Inclusion in Geosphere Austria’s Performance Agreement (Leistungsvereinbarung) with the responsible Austrian ministerial department (BMBWF) from 2026 onwards to be provided and maintained as operationally funded capability. |
| Deviations/ Reservations |
Possibility of FAIR principles implementation needs further investigation before it can be confirmed, in particular, concerning transferability of algorithms which needs local data of high quality. Internationalization strategies of GeoSphere and Energiewerkstatt are still TBD. |
| Potential Problems and Identified Solutions |
No problems identified yet |