MARINTEK is involved in research on condition monitoring of offshore wind-turbines; their instrumentation, data-analysis and operating logistics. Collaboration with industry, research institutes and test facilities has put MARINTEK in a unique position to exploit its long experience in the maritime and offshore industries in improving the operation and maintenance of offshore wind-turbines.
Published fault statistics on wind-turbines all over Europe show that electronics and electrical systems suffer from high failure rates. Such components have short repair times, which helps to reduce the down-time resulting from faults in these systems. Components with an unfavourable combination of high failure rates and long repair times include gear-boxes, rotatory systems and rotor blades, all of which currently lack satisfactory monitoring systems. One challenge to profitable operation of offshore wind farms is eliminating the need for interventions on the turbines.
MARINTEK is a member of NOWITECH (Norwegian Research Centre for Offshore Wind Technology) one of eight Norwegian research centres for environmentally friendly technology), which aims to develop good solutions for remote monitoring of offshore wind turbines by means of dedicated condition-monitoring instrumentation. Large offshore wind-farms of several hundred turbines will make significant demands of planning, prioritising and implementing maintenance programmes. Operating logistics and fleet planning for support vessels, spare parts and personnel are important areas that require more research to allow the envelopes of opportunity in base and field structures and choice of technical solutions to be described.
›› www.sintef.no/projectweb/nowitech
