THE CLIMATE OF EXTREME WINDS AT THE GREAT BELT, DENMARK

A study is undertaken of the extreme mean wind climate at the Great Belt, Denmark. The data material consists of a 9 year record of consecutive 10 min. averages of wind speed obtained from the meteorological mast on the island of Sprogo in the middle of the Great Belt. Two principal methods of extreme data abstraction are introduced namely the Peak-Over-Threshold (POT) method and the Annual Maximum (AM) method. Various statistical models have been applied both to the POT- and the AM-series data to investigate model behaviour for upper quantile estimates including assessment of uncertainty of these estimates. The applicability of the two methods is assessed and a recommendation is given for the most suitable method when dealing with short-term records (< 10 years). Finally, a comparison is made with adjusted extreme wind speed data from another meteorological site in Denmark.