Company
Our client is a worldwide owner of renewable power and climate transition assets, with a large ownership interest in wind farms.
Advanced Sensing, Software and Analytics
Utilising drivetrain CMS for foundation monitoring at US wind farm.
At a glance
- Use the existing drivetrain CMS
- Future-proofed wind assets
- Live data with 12-month view
Products
Challenge
Turbines offline with no root cause
The wind turbine was shut down until repairs were made due to the extent of the damage identified. And since there was no clear root cause, the client knew they required a monitoring strategy to warn them of future damage to the site’s
Multiple Foundation Issues
Based on gaps found under the bearing plate on one of the foundations, the client identified damage to the anchor foundations of one turbine. They also suspected risk of further damage to other foundations on the site.
Need for a proactive strategy
To develop a proactive wind turbine condition monitoring strategy and prevent future production loss, they turned to ONYX.
Solution
Diagnosing the Root Cause
Firstly, our wind turbine engineering team conducted a visual inspection of the client’s farm, selecting two turbines to test – the turbine with confirmed faults, and another control turbine presumed to be healthy
ONYX engineers installed strain gauges and inclinometers on the two turbines. In addition to this, our team collaborated with the client’s site team to install ecoCMS, our advanced sensing solution, across a total of five turbines to acquire a comparative data set.
At a mere fraction of the total cost of the project, ecoCMS is a cost-friendly solution that transforms your wind farm into a powerful data platform. Once a repair contractor visited to fix the known damaged foundation, ecoCMS data identified that there were anchor tension issues on a number of turbines.
Analysing the Foundation Monitoring Data
Analysing the data, our team clearly identified the indicators of the foundation damage (and the indicator to identify if anchor tension degraded again), before needing to shut down the turbine.
In addition to this, engineers correlated the rotational stiffness from the two turbines with the ecoCMS data, providing the client with stiffness estimates for all turbines monitored by ecoCMS. This allows comparison with OEM stiffness requirements, even when on turbines where stiffness monitoring did not occur.
“Utilising drivetrain CMS for foundations will revolutionise the industry’s approach to monitoring, delivery rich understand of an entire fleet with very little additional cost.
Extending the life of foundations longer and making the case for partial and full repowering even clearer”
John Coultate
VP, Advanced Sensing
Benefits
A Foundation for the Future
Our client can now call upon data-driven insights for current and future maintenance. No longer will downtime lead to lost revenue as a result of issues not being identified prior to foundation failure. Projections will also inform planning and budgeting to schedule possible future repairs, while still generating value.
The client can now account for external loads that could affect their turbines’ foundations, including environmental factors such as harsh wind loads and cliff erosion. Since the project, ONYX has continued to provide the client with ongoing decision-making support for foundation maintenance.
Most Valuable Insights
1) Get more out of your drivetrain CMS
Leverage existing drivetrain CMS for ongoing foundation monitoring.
2) Future-proof wind assets
Ongoing structural health monitoring and consultancy, illustrating trends and de-risking the possibility of future foundation issues.
3) Pinpoint your intensive testing on known issues
By elevating your understanding to the entire fleet it enables owner/ operators to focus value resource on foundations of concern.
Know your foundations before you repower.
Make informed investment decisions with structural insight that reveals which turbines are truly repower-ready.