A €3 million project that will inform the development of more robust and resilient offshore wind turbine components has won funding in Germany.
The Reliable Power Converters for Wind Turbines (ReCoWind) project, which runs until November 2021 has secured financial support from the German Federal Ministry for Economics Affairs and Energy (BMWi) is providing financial support.
Power converters are among the most frequently failing components of wind turbines. Economic losses of around €200 million a year arise in Germany alone due to repair costs and revenue losses resulting from failures of these components.
At offshore wind sites, especially, repairs present a logistical challenge and cannot be carried out at short notice.
A project consortium composed of operators and manufacturers of turbines, semiconductors, and converters is working closely together with research and academic partners in ReCoWind.
The consortium includes Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy Systems (IWES), Innogy, Senvion, Nordsee One and the University of Bremen.
Within the three-year project, field data from various sites and turbine types will be analysed, damage models will be derived and experimental tests will be performed on components.
The project partners want to increase their understanding of influencing factors that trigger defects and what processes occur up to the failure of power electronic components.
The main focus of ReCoWind is on the semiconductor modules, within converters, their driver units as well as the direct current-link components that represent the core parts of the converters.
Particular attention will be paid to the influence of moisture on converter performance.
The information base of the project is to be expanded using special measuring techniques which are being developed specifically by the partners. They will be tested on commercial components under realistic conditions.
It is hoped the project will pave the way for more robust converter design, as well as the development of procedures for accelerated component testing, as well as improved concepts for operation and maintenance.
On the basis of experimental investigations, damage models and models for calculation of the remaining service life will be generated in the project.
At the same time, comprehensive failure and operating data will be evaluated and field measurements will be carried out at the offshore wind farm Nordsee One with its 54 6MW turbines.
Fraunhofer IWES head of department Christian Broer said: “Thanks to the involvement of various actors from the value chain and research sector, we are able to achieve genuine added value.
“In this way, we can also ensure the transfer of the findings to the design and development phases as well as to the operation of existing turbines.”
The findings will ultimately be used to derive recommendations relating to design, instrumentation, and operation and maintenance, which will be made available to the industry.