Hill of Towie wind farm open dataset

The Hill of Towie wind farm open dataset provides over 10 years of comprehensive operational data from a commercial wind farm in Scotland suitable for various wind energy research topics. This dataset includes:

• README.md: A description of the datapack
• Hill_of_Towie_turbine_metadata.csv: Metadata for the 21 Siemens SWT-2.3-VS-82 turbines including coordinates, rated power, rotor diameter and hub height.
• 2016.zip, 2017.zip, … , 2026.zip: 10-minute statistics and alarm log data from the Hill of Towie SCADA system zipped by year from January 2016 to April 2026 (inclusive). The 10-min SCADA data was downloaded from the Siemens wind farm SCADA Backup facility and converted to .csv format without modification except dropping certain columns to ensure anonymity for SCADA system users. All SCADA 10-min timestamps are in UTC and 10-minute timestamps represent the end of the 10-minute period.
• Files ending in “_description.csv” provide descriptions of SCADA Backup file contents, key 10-minute columns and key alarm codes.
• Hill_of_Towie_AeroUp_install_dates.csv: provides information on AeroUp installation timing for each turbine.
• Hill_of_Towie_ShutdownDuration.zip:contains 10-minute statistics calculated from a combination of the SCADA data and RES operator logs. This data quantifies downtime in seconds for each turbine for each 10 minutes (0 means no downtime, 600 means 10 minutes of downtime). This file covers Version 1.0.0 (ends August 2024).
• turbine_fastlog.zip: high-resolution (~1Hz) turbine and Dynamic Yaw controller data covering Jan–Apr 2026
• lidar_data.zip: 10-min and high-resolution LiDAR data covering Jan–Apr 2026
• ZXMS-RES029-REP01-01.pdf: ZX300 LiDAR deployment report
• ZXMS-RES035-REP01-01.pdf: ZXTM LiDAR deployment report

The dataset has been released by RES on behalf of TRIG under a CC-BY-4.0 open data license and is provided as-is.  RES is the world’s largest independent renewable energy company and has been an industry innovator for over 40 years.  RES’ retrofit upgrade products such as AeroUp, TuneUp and Dynamic Yaw have been developed using expertise from deep knowledge of the industry.  TRIG, the owner of Hill of Towie, was one of the first investment companies investing in renewable energy infrastructure projects listed on the London Stock Exchange and is now a member of the FTSE-250 index.

The Hill of Towie open dataset provides a unique opportunity to study energy yield increase following wind farm upgrades. Upgrades contained in the dataset include:

• T13 AeroUp installation completed 29 September 2021
• AeroUp roll out to all other turbines from 14 July 2022 to 26 May 2023. Further details of install dates are provided in Hill_of_Towie_AeroUp_install_dates.csv.
• TuneUp validation campaign starting for 8 of 9 test turbines 14 March 2024 (T02, T03, T06, T08, T09, T13, T16, T20) and the 9th test turbine (T21) on 2 May 2024 and ending at the end of August 2024
• Dynamic Yaw wind farm control validation campaign from 2026-01-07 to the end of April 2026. Dynamic Yaw was active for 14 test turbines; control was toggled on and off on a 100-minute period (50 minutes on followed by 50 minutes off). Note for the six east turbines (T16 to T21) the campaign begins on 2026-02-03.

The Hill of Towie open dataset is applicable to many areas of research including:

• validation of pre-construction energy yield models (including wind flow and wake models)
• refinement of post-construction energy yield analysis techniques
• wind farm performance analysis, alarm prediction and forecasting research
• wind farm control techniques such as collective yaw control and wake steering
• LiDAR-based turbine performance and wake model validation

Example usage of the dataset is shown in this repository: https://github.com/resgroup/hill-of-towie-open-source-analysis

Acknowledgement

Thank you to TRIG for allowing us to make this dataset publicly available.

Thank you to the creators of the Kelmarsh and SMARTEOLE open datasets, which provided the inspiration for this dataset.

Thank you to ZX LiDARs for assisting with LiDAR data and deployment reports.