The Wind Atlas for Southern Africa (WASA) aims to assist in the development of large grid-connected wind farms and to provide more accurate wind resource data to identify potential opportunities for off-grid electrification. Mapping has been carried out in the Western Cape, parts of the Northern Cape and the Eastern Cape. More funding from the Danish Government will see the Atlas being expanded into the remaining areas of the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and parts of the Free State.
The Numerical Wind Atlas Database contains generalised wind climate data sets (.lib files) for every 5km x 5km, corresponding to approximately 15000 data points that can be employed directly with WAsP (licensed version) for wind farm planning and wind resource assessment. Unlicensed WAsP software (free download from www.wasp.dk ) allows viewing of the generalised Wind Climate .lib files, but will not allow any calculations to be done. One can register for data downloads on the WASA website at www.wasa.csir.co.za
WASA (2009 to 2014) is an initiative of the South African Government, Department of Energy, and the project is co-funded by the UNDP-GEF through the South African Wind Energy Programme (SAWEP), and the Royal Danish Embassy. The South African National Energy Research Institute (SANERI) is the Executing Partner, coordinating and contracting contributions from the implementing partners: CSIR, UCT, SAWS, and Risø, now DTU Wind Energy.
A guide to downloading data and data set downloads can be found at http://www.wasa.csir.co.za/