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Latest Issue
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- Category: Articles
Variability Analyses and Considerations About Uncertainty for Long-Term Prediction
The evolution of long-term wind resources is a key issue in the wind industry, especially in the context of energy yield assessments. Thus, analysing the evolution of the long-term wind trends in the past should allow a better appreciation of their variability and potentially the risk of experiencing periods with low wind resources in the future.By Marion Jude, Eoltech, France
- Category: Articles
Supply Chain Holistic Approach to Offshore Wind Levelised Cost of Electricity CompetitivenessZero-subsidy offshore wind projects awarded in Germany and the Netherlands in 2018 have raised expectations worldwide. However, although these are significant competitiveness milestones, they are still bound to the particular market characteristics that made them possible.
Javier San Miguel Armendariz, Global Sales Director Wind Energy, Ingeteam, Spain
- Category: Articles
The Optimal Choice Between Continued Operation, Repowering and DecommissioningMore and more players in the German wind energy sector are concerned with the question of how to deal with the ageing German wind fleet, as around 5,200 turbines will simultaneously reach the end of the feed-in-tariff funding period of the Renewable Energy Sources Act for the first time at the end of 2020. Around 8,000 wind turbines will follow by the end of 2025, as shown in Figure 1. Operators of affected wind turbines will then have the choice between (I) continuing to operate the old turbine within the framework of direct marketing on the European Power Exchange, (II) repowering the old turbine by a new and more efficient wind turbine at plant-specific feed-in premium levels tendered in the German renewable energy auctions or (III) decommissioning the respective plant.
By Jan-Hendrik Piel and Martin Westbomke, Germany
- Category: Articles
The Digital Threat to Wind FarmsA number of high-profile hacking cases have hit the headlines in recent years, highlighting the increasing rise in cybercrime and the devastating effects it can have on the targeted organisations. Mohamed Harrou, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) engineer at BayWa r.e., talks to Windtech International about the susceptibility of wind farms to cybercrime and why the time to act is now.
By Mohamed Harrou, SCADA Engineer, BayWa r.e., Germany
- Category: Articles
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After remotely monitoring several thousand wind turbines over the past 10 years, most of the wind turbine faults detected and diagnosed by the Brüel & Kjær Vibro Surveillance Centres have been related to the drive train. In this article, two case studies are given where the faults were detected and diagnosed in an entirely different but important component – the yaw bearing system. It is this system that bears the enormous static and dynamic loads of the nacelle and blades, and allows the nacelle to align itself into the wind.
By Mike Hastings, Senior Application Engineer, Brüel & Kjær Vibro, Denmark
- Category: Articles
Premature Failures in Wind Turbine GearboxesPremature failures in rolling bearings do not occur very often. In a wide range of applications including wind turbine gearboxes, however, premature bearing failures due to subsurface cracks have become increasingly reported, leading to high costs due to unscheduled downtime and unplanned maintenance efforts. The phenomenon of subsurface cracks in the microstructure of the bearing steel is often referred to as white etching cracks. ‘White etching’ refers to the white appearance of the altered microstructure when a microsection is polished and etched.
By Balasubramaniam Vengudusamy and Fabio Zanella, Klüber Lubrication München, Germany
- Category: Articles
Remote Sensing Device Performance CredentialsThe progress of lidars within the wind industry has been charted from the start by Windtech International. Articles as far back as the very first edition of the publication in 2004 have highlighted not only the fundamental principles of lidar, but also its applications – onshore, offshore and turbine mounted. On 18 June 2018, a significant milestone was reached whereby vertical profiling lidars – Leosphere’s Windcube and ZephIR’s 300 model – achieved levels of IEC Classification that allow consultants, developers and turbine manufacturers to have further confidence in the technology’s ability to measure across a range of environmental conditions. The lidars were demonstrated to operate with known and low uncertainties, making them suitable for the variety of applications that have become synonymous with these remote sensing devices: from resource assessment and site calibration to formal power curve testing.
By Ian Locker, John Medley, Michael Harris and Alex Woodward, ZephIR, UK
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