INTELWIND

Development of an intelligent condition monitoring system for application on critical rotating components of industrial-scale wind turbines

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Wind energy currently provides approximately 3% of the overall European electricity production. However, with the current growth trends exhibited the wind energy industry is capable of delivering 12% of the overall European power production by 2020 and more than 20% by 2030.

Operation and maintenance costs (O&M) constitute a sizeable share of the total annual costs of a wind turbine. For a new machine, operation and maintenance costs might easily have an average share over the lifetime of a turbine of more than 30% of the total levellised cost per kWh produced. Therefore, operation and maintenance costs are increasingly attracting the attention of manufacturers seeking to develop new designs requiring fewer regular service visits and less out-time. In order for the wind energy industry to achieve the growth targets set by the EU for the forthcoming years, wind turbine numbers have to increase substantially, while at the same time their operation and maintenance costs will need to be reduced by a noticeable factor to permit the European wind energy industry to retain its advantage over growing overseas competition. Therefore, one of the highest priorities for the European wind energy industry is currently the significant improvement of the reliability of wind turbines, involving a solid reduction in current inspection and maintenance costs mainly associated with unpredicted failures of critical rotating components.

INTELWIND seeks to largely decrease the number of failures of critical rotating components in wind turbines and minimise the need for corrective maintenance by developing and successfully implementing an intelligent condition monitoring system based on the integration of acoustic emission, vibration analysis, torque sensing and oil analysis techniques. Although the INTELWIND consortium will aim to incorporate the developed system on newly manufactured wind turbines, its installation in older wind turbines will also be possible as well as affordable.'

Descrizione progetto (Article)

Manufacturers of wind turbines are focusing on improving reliability in order to reduce operation and maintenance costs. To achieve this, new designs are being developed that require fewer regular service visits and less time lost through non-operation.

The EU-funded http://intelwind-project.com (INTELWIND) initiative aimed to significantly reduce the number of failures in critical rotating components of industrial-scale wind turbines. It further sought to reduce the need for corrective maintenance by developing and implementing an intelligent monitoring system. This condition monitoring system (CMS) is based on the integration of acoustic emissions, vibrations, torque sensing and oil data from sensors.

Sensors already included in wind turbine logging systems provided the reference parameters needed for data analysis, such as wind speed and direction and power output. INTELWIND developed algorithms and embedded them into the CMS to provide data allowing for estimations of the wear on bearings as well as other factors. The data are compared with a series of 'healthy' key performance indices. If a value outside the acceptance range is identified, an alarm is triggered. This provides the capacity for automated monitoring and early intervention.

The CMS represents a major step forward in monitoring the condition of wind turbines. It not only identifies faults in critical rotating components, it enables the continuous measure and recording of the load on components making up the drive train. This is achieved by a surface acoustic wave sensor for measuring torque in the high-speed shaft in combination with the developed software. Together with software for estimating the remaining life of components, these developments represent a new era in preventative maintenance for wind turbines.

INTELWIND's intelligent system can be incorporated into both newly manufactured turbines and older installations. It will lead to significant savings related to expensive replacement equipment such as gear boxes, as well as savings on maintenance costs.