Envision Energy has announced the grid connection of a prototype 16MW offshore wind turbine, the EN-256/16.7, in China.
Deep-sea conditions are notoriously demanding, necessitating exceptional reliability from high-capacity wind turbines.
The EN-256/16.7 has emerged from Envision Energy’s in-house research and development, with innovations specifically tailored for deep-sea scenarios from manufacturing, delivery, installation, transportation to operation.
Its core components have been “comprehensively optimised and upgraded, enhancing its power generation performance, and providing a new solution for offshore wind power development in deep-sea areas”.
The deep-sea environment pose challenges to the reliability and cost of various aspects of large wind turbine transportation, installation, and maintenance.
The prototype aims to address issues such as shortages of offshore wind turbine maintenance vessels, high costs, unstable ship schedules, and long component replacement cycles.
The product employs modular design and reserves self-developed tooling interfaces, requiring only simple tools to complete component replacements such as external cooling core bodies and transformer windings.
Modular subcontracting and pre-assembly strategies also free the turbine from constraints related to transportation routes and port capacities, enabling delivery in diverse scenarios.