I was led to believe from previous information that biggest problems with offshore wind turbines was gearbox failure.
However It appears that I was wrong. Gearbox failure is not the most prevalent fault.
Failures of electrical and controls systems are the root cause of wind turbine repairs in 50% of cases, and operators should expect an electronic or electrical subassembly failure every 2 to 2.5 years, according to Wind Energy Update’s Offshore operations and Maintenance report 2011, released today.
So let me get this straight in my mind. We have a failure rate of the gearboxes after only seven years, and now it is iterated that we have electrical failures every 2 to 2.5 years.
According to the report’s authors, while the failure rate event of electrical system and control faults/failures may not have the highest associated downtime, a higher frequency of occurrence translates into the highest mean annual downtime.
Has our Energy secretary been appraised with these facts as he dashes for more bird mincers? Probably not.
I leave you with this little snippet.
With estimated annual O&M costs at €100,000 to €300,000 per 2MW-3MW offshore turbine and at €200,000 to €720,000 for larger turbines (according to a previous Wind Energy Update report), operators need access to more reliable data, stresses the report.
You can read the whole article HERE.
And weep.
