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Offshore Wind: Some of The Engineering Challenges Ahead
Offshore Wind: Some of The Engineering Challenges Ahead
David Infield CDT in Wind Energy Systems Institute of Energy and Environment University of Strathclyde
UK context
UKs binding EU commitment is to provide 15% of all energy from renewable sources by 2020 (RE Directive) This implies perhaps 35% of electricity from RE DECC now plans 33 GW of offshore capacity by 2020
Renewable energy technology Biomass Wave energy Tidal energy Severn barrage Wind energy PV Current contribution to UK electricity 2% <0.1% <0.1% 0% 5 3% <0.1% 37 2 25% 35% 20% 112.7 0.5 28.5% 1.00% Potential 2020 scenario GW Load factor 50% 34% 42% TWh % UK electricity
6 1 1
TOTAL
40.7%
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Some remarks
Wind turbines do experience regular major component failure very approximately up to once per year Onshore turbine availability can be high (97%+) despite these failure rates Offshore operations and turbine repair are far more expensive Offshore annual availability data in the public domain is limited but shows a wide range of figures from 67 to 95% (the latter for sheltered sites in the Baltic) Offshore turbine access limitation in high seas and winds and heavy lifting restrictions in these conditions is a major factor and results in lost turbine operation following faults Some round 3 sites are very far from shore Grid connection requires extensive sub-sea cabling
2 Repower 5 MW turbines mounted on jackets in over 40 metres of water at Beatrice in Murray Forth
9
10
2007 54
2006 92
2007 76
2008 76
2005 84
2006 75
2007 84
9.0
9.2
8.0
7.8
8.0
7.4
7.9
8.6
11
12
Condition monitoring
Condition monitoring has been used successfully in other engineering applications and is increasingly used for wind farms BUT It does have a cost It must be carefully thought through It can easily result in unwanted alarms The value to the wind farm operator (on or offshore) is not yet well quantified If the information gained from CM does not result in a change to the way the wind farms are maintained and operated, then there will be no financial benefits
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Brief conclusions
Round 3 sites will account for most of the UK wind capacity by 2020 and are very challenging in all regards A new generation of turbines and sub-sea support structures will be required to exploit the offshore resource Managing offshore wind assets effectively will be key to future success of offshore wind power Whole system approaches to offshore wind farm design and asset management need to be developed New power collection arrangement and connection to the power system/s will be required Much research to be done to underpin these technology developments
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