The leading technical problems with wind turbines

Explore the obstacles wind farm owners are facing in their battle against downtime and loss of revenue 

As the fastest-growing energy source in the United States, renewable energy from water, solar and wind power increased 100% from 2000 to 2018. Globally, renewable energy is expected to make up 45% of total electricity generation by 2040, up from 26.2% in 2018. [1]

In 2020, wind power became the most-used source of renewable energy in the United States, finally surpassing hydropower after many years. [2] Wind power has become the renewable energy champion for a near endless list of positive environmental, financial and economic impacts.

Despite the energy source’s many benefits, the technical challenges posed by power generation from wind turbines causes many wind farm owners to be in a near constant battle against downtime and loss of revenue. 

Continue reading to learn about the technical problems with wind turbines, plus why comprehensive testing and monitoring is the solution to many of these problems for wind farms.

Optimizing turbine positioning.

When a wind farm is initially constructed, one of the most important factors for an owner to consider is where the turbines are placed.

When turbines gain momentum and generate power from wind, they create vortical structures that interact, increasing the turbulence of the flow and infringing upon the success of downstream rotors. Optimizing the positioning of turbines based on turbine type and wind conditions is essential to avoiding reduced power production and other issues.

Many wind farm owners avoid these problems from happening in the first place by utilizing innovative tools to accurately and efficiently simulate the wake of a wind turbine in a specific location. However, if wind turbines are placed and impede the success of others, detailed analysis of the flow can be conducted to analyze ways in which productivity can be increased with the existing placement. 

Combatting unexpected mechanical failures.

As with many other industries, the maintenance of wind turbines has always been focused on reacting to problems instead of preventing issues from arising in the first place.

Unexpected mechanical failures are common in wind turbines because of the rigorous demands placed on key equipment such as gearboxes. Many wind farm owners find themselves faced with costly mechanical repairs from short-circuits and other failures that not only require too much of their money, but too much of their time as well.

Continuous monitoring on the rotating parts and other components of wind turbine generators can effectively identify potential problems before they even occur. With actionable data from continuous monitoring, wind farmers can design and implement operations and maintenance (O&M) programs that prevent costly, unexpected failures. 

Predicting the accurate lifetime of components.

While wind power plants currently have an average operational life of 20 years, the lifetime of the turbine equipment pieces differs drastically for each component. These lifespan differences for components such as rotors, controls, electronics and gearboxes stem from the highly irregular loading input from turbulent wind conditions.

Since the lifetime of the components varies so greatly, it’s impossible for wind farmers to successfully predict their lifespan without comprehensive monitoring solutions. Continuous monitoring of the different parts of wind turbines allows operators to understand why they need to improve load mitigation and reduce extreme loads to extend the fatigue life of their turbines.

Learn more:
Why you should use wind turbine sensors to measure shaft temperature and torsion

Maximizing power output.

Another leading problem that wind farm owners face is monitoring the capacity factor of their turbines to maximize power output.

Improving the capacity factor of wind turbines is essential because it effectively keeps energy costs low by producing the most amount of power possible without overworking the components.  

Many owners have been able to solve this problem with wind turbines by utilizing control and monitoring tools that provide them with the data they need to understand how to maximize their power output at less than 12 meters per second and switch rapidly to protect turbines at higher speeds by limiting power. [3]

How Sensatek can help

Our TurboTrack real-time testing and monitoring system provides online monitoring with real-time data and actionable solutions for wind turbines that help operators increase efficiency, eliminate downtime and decrease loss of revenue.

Our wind turbine solutions use our innovative TurboTrack technology that has been proven highly effective for many other types of power generating turbines including jet engines.

Interested in increasing efficiency and eliminating downtime?
Contact us today to get started.   

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Sources:

1: Center for Climate and Energy Solutions | Renewable Energy
2: U.S. Energy Information Administration | Wind has surpassed hydro as the most-used renewable electricity generation source in the U.S.
3: Frontiers | Grand challenges in wind energy research