WIND TURBINE TECHNOLOGY

& COMPONENTS

N. Raj Kumar,
Measurements & Testing Division,
National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE)
 WIND TURBINE
 Wind turbine – device which
converts the kinetic wind energy
into electric energy
 Kinetic Energy in the wind
1/2 ρ A V3
 Lift force derived from the blades
are used to drive the rotor----
Mechanical Energy
 Mechanical Energy available at a
low rpm.
 Stepped up using gearbox and
converted into electrical energy
using generator Or Directly
converted into electrical energy
using generator (Direct Drives)
2
A COUPLE OF THINGS TO REMEMBER…
Power in the Wind =
½ρAV 3
 Swept Area – A = πR2 (m2)
Area of the circle swept by the
rotor.
 ρ = air density - its about
1.225-kg/m3
R
 OVERALL LAYOUT / TOPOLOGY
Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines (HAWT) account for
almost all utility scale wind turbines installed.
Vertical-axis wind turbines
exist, but they are theoretically less aerodynamically
efficient than horizontal-axis turbines.
Can be classified by their technical characteristics,
including:
 rotor placement (upwind or downwind);
 the number of blades (1/2/3);
 the output regulation system for the
generator;(Pitch or Stall)
 the rotational speed of the rotor (fixed / Variable).
 Geared / or direct drive with
synchronous generator
 Geared (multi-stage gearbox
with high speed generator; single
stage gearbox with medium speed
generator);
 Types of Generator (Synchronous / Asynchronous)
 wind turbine capacity.

4
NUMBER OF BLADES

5
ROTOR DIAMETER

6
STEADY STATE POWER CURVE

7
 RATED WIND SPEED

Annual Mean Wind Speed V 8 m/sec

Air Density Rho 1.225 Kg/m^3
Rated Power planned P 2000 kW
Ratio for Optimum rated wind speed 1.4 -
Targetted Power Coefficient (max) Cp 0.45 -

Rated Wind Speed V rated 11.2 m/sec

8
Swept Area A 5164.845 m^2
Rotor Diameter D 81.09307 m
Airfoil Nomenclature & Pitch
angle
Wind turbines will typically
start generating electricity at
a wind speed of 3 to 5 metres
per second (m/s), reach
maximum power at 15 m/s
and generally cut-out at a
wind speed of around 25 m/s.
PITCH CONTROL
VSPR CONTROL

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TIP SPEED RATIO

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 DESIGN TIP SPEED RATIO

 Ratio of rotor tip speed

to free wind speed
 The design tip speed
ratio of a rotor is that
tip speed ratio where
the power coefficient is
a maximum.
 Selection of this value
will have a major
impact on the design of
the entire turbine.

13
 Wind turbine class

IEC Wind Class

2 (Med.
1 (High Wind) 3 (Low Wind)
Wind)
Reference
50 m/s 42.5 m/s 37.5 m/s
Wind Speed
Annual
Average
10 m/s 8.5 m/s 7.5 m/s
Wind Speed
(Max)
50-year
70 m/s 59.5 m/s 52.5 m/s
Return Gust
1-year Return
52.5 m/s 44.6 m/s 39.4 m/s
Gust
SCALING UP TO LOWER THE COST

15
ADVANCEMENTS
 Decreasing Specific Power
 Mass Specific Torque Development

 Advanced Controls for load reduction

 Blade materials (Carbon fibre) & geometry

(Sweep, Bend Twist Coupling, etc.,)
 Drive Train Configuration

16
 PERFORMANCE ENHANCEMENT OPTIONS

Power Resource
4000

3500

3000

2500
Power (kW)

2000

1500

1000

500

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40

Windspeed (m /s) Windspeed (m /s)

Turbine pow er Betz Pow er Rayleigh Probability Weibull Probability

Larger Rotor Taller Tower

Rotor costs increase Tower costs increase
with diameter cubed, approximately by
Rotor power grows height to the fourth
with the diameter power (due to diameter
squared constraints)
We can only win this battle if we build rotors that are smarter
and components that are lighter to beat the squared-cubed law.
 DECREASING SPECIFIC POWER
 Specific Power = Capacity / Swept Area
 On average, however, turbines have grown in height and
rotor diameter more rapidly than have their power
capacities.
 This decrease in the specific power has pushed up
capacity factors considerably for the same wind speeds
 Reducing the energy cost has been the primary driver of
this evolution

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DECREASING SPECIFIC POWER
 Consider, for example, a “strong” turbine of
specific power (relative to the swept area) of 530
W/m2, assuming on a given site a capacity factor
of 32.4%.
 On the same site, a “weak” turbine of only 294 W/
m2 will have a capacity factor of 48.9%.
 For same swept areas, the weak turbine will
generate only 83.7% of the electricity of a strong
turbine, but will require a connecting line of only
55.5% of the capacity of that needed for the
strong turbine (Molly, 2011).
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CAPACITY FACTOR

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 How Do We Get to Low-Cost,

page 21
Low-Wind-Speed Technology?
(Thresher: 5/02) Estimated COE
• Technology
Larger-scaleImprovements
2 - 5MW - (rotors up to 120m) Improvement
0%  5%
• Advanced rotors and controls –
(flexible, low-solidity, higher speed, hybrid carbon-glass -15%  7%
and advanced and innovative designs)
• Advanced drive train concepts -
(Hybrid drive trains with low-speed PM generators and -10%  7%
other innovative designs including reduced cost PE)
• New tower concepts - (taller, modular, field assembled,
load feedback control) -2%  5%
• Improved availability and reduced losses - (better controls, -5%  3%
siting and improved availability)
• Manufacturing improvements - (new manufacturing methods, -
7%  3%
volume production and learning effects)
• Region and site tailored designs (tailoring of larger 100MW -5%  2%
wind farm turbine designs to unique sites)
 WT BLADE WEIGHT V ROTOR SIZE S

 Wind turbine blades are now

so large that gravity and
inertia loads have started to
dominate more than
aerodynamic loads.

 It is therefore of increasing
importance to reduce weight.

 Using normal scaling laws,

the weight of wind turbine
blades should increase with
length to the power of three.

 However, historically, blade

weights have only
increased to the power of
2.2 as blade manufacturers
have successfully improved
the aerodynamic performance
and control of wind turbines,
as well as their structural
design, and have optimized
the use of materials and
process technology.
22
Source:
‘Introduction to Wind turbine blade design’ by F. M O LHOLT JENSEN, Bladena, Denmark and K. BRANNER,
Technical University of Denmark.
 WT BLADE DESIGN
The design of a wind turbine
blade is a compromise between
aerodynamic and structural
considerations.

Aerodynamic considerations
usually dominate the design of
the outer two-thirds of the
blade while structural
considerations are more
important for the design of the
inner one-third of the blade.

Structurally the blade is

typically hollow with the outer
geometry formed by two shells:
one on the suction side and one
on the pressure side.
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One or more structural webs

are fitted to join the two shells
MEASURE THROUGH MASS SPECIFIC
TORQUE DEVELOPMENT
 A measure for this development is the torque which can be
taken over per kg tower head mass (= complete machinery
including rotor blades on top of the tower).
 The first survey was made in 1990 and at that time showed
a maximum of about 5 Nm/kg for the mass-specific torque.
 If these wind turbines were economical in their use the
corresponding maximum rotor size was about 40 m
diameter.
 Assuming that the further increase in size would have been
done without any technical innovation, that means that if
it would not be possible to reach more than the maximum
mass-specific torque of 5 Nm/kg, the resulting energy yield
per kg tower head mass would be reduced proportional to
D1 / D2, with D2 as the larger rotor diameter (Fig. 6) or
from 40 kWh/kg down to 20 kWh/kg.
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MASS SPECIFIC TORQUE DEVELOPMENT

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 WIND TURBINE
 Modern Wind Turbines - HAWT (Horizontal
Axis Wind Turbine) & VSPR (Variable Speed
Pitch Regulated)
 To extract as much energy from the wind as
possible and each component of the turbine
has to be optimised for that goal.
 Requirements defined in IEC 61400-1 (Wind
Turbines – Design Requirements)
 Engineering and technical requirements to
ensure the safety of the structural,
mechanical, electrical and control systems of
the wind turbine.
 Design Life Time – 20 years 26
COMPONENTS – TYPICAL DRIVE TRAIN

27
COMPONENTS – DIRECT DRIVE

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 CONCEPTUAL DESIGN
 WT Design is the process of defining the form
and specifications of a wind turbine to extract
energy from Wind.
 It involves the conceptual assembling of a large
number of mechanical and electrical components
into a machine which can convert the varying
power in the wind into a useful form.
 Consists of Four main parts:
 Tower top Components (Drivetrain)
 Rotor
 Tower
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 Foundation
 MAJOR SYSTEMS
 Rotor
 Nacelle

 Tower

 Control & Protection System

 Yaw System

 Pitch System

 Braking

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 MAJOR COMPONENTS
 Tower  Mechanical Brake
 Blades  Controller
 Hub  Converter
 Pitch System  Torque Arm
 Yaw System  Main Frame
 Main Shaft  Sensors
 Main Bearing  Hydraulic Systems
 Gearbox  Cooling Systems
 Couplings  Locking Devices
 Generator  Nose cone

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 ROTOR
 Transforms the energy contained in the
wind into mechanical rotations
 Consist of one to three rotor blades and
a rotor hub.
 Rotor blades extract part of the kinetic
energy from the moving air and the
maximum possible efficiency stands at
59 %(Betz limit).
 Blades of the wind turbine have airfoil
sections.

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 ROTOR BLADE
 Normally, Glass fiber reinforced plastics (FRP).
 With increasing plant size, there are a cases of
carbon fiber reinforced plastics.
 The predominant criterion for material selection
is fatigue strength, but also the specific weight,
admissible stress, modulus of elasticity and
breaking strength.
 Deciding factors are also the development,
material and manufacturing costs resulting from
these technical key factors.
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 ROTOR BLADE
Need to have following design requirements:
 Low density

 Good mechanical properties, fatigue life

 Good corrosion resistance

 High Strength to weight ratio

 Tailorability of material properties

 Ease in formation of aerodynamic shape

versatility of fabrication methods
 Lower cost

 Stiffness to avoid resonance and aero-elastic

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stability
 ROTOR HUB
 Fixture for attaching the blades to
the rotor shaft.
 Loadings on the hub consist of the
aerodynamic, gravity and inertia
loadings on the blades and the
equal and opposite (discounting
hub self-weight) reaction from the
shaft.
 Nodular cast iron
 A major reason for using cast iron
is the complex shape of the hub,
which makes it hard to produce in
any other way.
 It must be highly resistant to
metal fatigue.
 Thus, any welded hub structure is
regarded as less feasible. 35
 ROTOR HUB (TYPES)
Tri-cylindrical or spherical:
 three cylindrical shells concentric
with the blade axes (tri-cylindrical)
 spherical shell with cut-outs at the
three blade mounting positions
(spherical).
Hingeless rigid hub, has cantilevered
blades and transmits all moments to
the tower.
Teetering rotor, has two rigidly
connected blades supported by a
teeter pin joint, which can only
transmit in plane moments to the
hub. Flapwise moments are not
transmitted.

Hingeless Spherical hub (rigid hub) is

the most common configuration in
modern wind turbines. 36
 HUB ENCLOSURE (NOSE CONE)
 The hub enclosure,
which is sometimes
referred to as the nose
cone, is usually made of
glass fibre reinforced
polyester.
 In cases where the hub
enclosure is large, it is
recommended to
consider the wind load it
will be exposed to.
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 PITCH SYSTEM
 Turns the whole length of the rotor
blades along the longitudinal axis
 Requires a design that ensures that
the blades are pitched at the exact
angle.
 Torque needed for the pitching of the
rotor blades is applied by a pitch motor
with the associated pitch gearbox. The
torque is transmitted by the pitch
teeth to the blade bearing fixed to the
rotor blade.
 Torque needed for the pitching of the
rotor blades is applied by a hydraulic
cylinder. The torque is transmitted by
the piston rod directly or indirectly to a
linking point fixed to the rotor blade.
 For pitch systems with individual pitch
drives/actuators ensuring sufficient
redundancy, these may be considered
to be in component class 2. 38
 PITCH SYSTEM COMPONENTS
 Pitch Bearings with one or
more Planetary gear unit
 Planetary gear unit
equipped with output
pinion and electric motor
 Torque needed for the
pitching of the rotor blades
is applied by a pitch motor
with the associated pitch
gearbox. The torque is
transmitted by the pitch
teeth to the blade bearing
fixed to the rotor blade.
 Planetary Gear unit – High
reduction ratio in less space
 Three Stage slewing
planetary gear units 39
PTCH DRIVE - PLANETARY GEAR
UNIT

40
BRAKING / HALTING
 To be halted for routine maintenance purposes or at
cut- out wind speed.
 Hard Mechanical braking by the disc creates
considerable amount of stresses of various parts of
drive train.
 Soft Braking concept – mechanical brakes are applied
only after aerodynamic braking
 Aerodynamic stopping – Primary braking method
 Mechanical Stopping – Secondary Braking method
 Aerodynamic braking
 Also called as Soft braking
 Full length of the blade is turned longitudinally by 90 deg 41
to feather with leading edge facing the wind
 AERODYNAMIC BRAKING
Stall Maximum lift occurs at the outer one third part of the
controlled blade
WT Turnable blade tips (Pitchable tips)
Pitch Done by Full feathering.
Controlled Full length of the blade is turned longitudinally by 90
WT deg to feather with the leading edge facing the wind to
spoil the lift force.
All the three blades have same angular setting and
are simultaneously actuated.
Active Stall Pitched in a few steps in the opposite direction so that
controlled the rotor goes into a deeper stall and if it is pitched still
further till the trailing edge faces the wind to spoil the
lift force.

42
 PITCHABLE TIPS
 During normal operation, pitchable
tip is held inline with the main
blade profile against centrifugal
force by a hydraulic cylinder.
 A spring loaded centrifugal latch
releases the tip brake when
aerodynamic braking is required.
 Tip is allowed to move outboard
and a cam rotates it until it is
almost perpendicular to plane of
rotation about 90 deg.
 The hydraulic system in the turbine
is used turn the blades or blade tips
back in place.
 Other aerodynamic controls- Tip
flaps (or ailerons), Tip brakes (or
tip vanes), Yaw control 43
 BRAKING SYSTEM (IEC 61400-1)
 The braking system shall be able to bring
the rotor to idling mode or complete stop
from any operation condition.
 It is recommended that at least one
braking system operate on an
aerodynamic principle, as such acting
directly on the rotor.
 If this recommendation is not met at
least one braking system shall act on the
rotor shaft or on the rotor of the wind
turbine.
 Brakes shall be designed to function even
if their external power supply fails.
 A brake shall be able to keep the rotor in
the full stop position for the defined wind
conditions for at least one hour after the
brake is applied. During longer periods of
grid loss, it shall be possible to apply the
brake by either an auxiliary power
supply or by manual operation. 44
 YAW SYSTEM (AZIMUTH DRIVE)
 Yaw denotes the rotation of the
nacelle and the rotor about the
vertical tower axis.
 By yawing the wind turbine, the
rotor can be positioned such that
the wind hits the rotor plane at a
right angle.
 The yaw system provides a
mechanism to yaw the turbine and
to keep the rotor axis aligned with
the direction of the wind.
 If situations occur where this
alignment is not achieved, yaw
errors are produced. The yaw error,
or the yaw angle, is defined as the
angle between the horizontal
projections of the wind direction 45
and the rotor axis.
 YAW SYSTEM
 The yaw system can be either passive or active.
 A passive yaw system implies that the rotor plane is kept
perpendicular to the direction of the wind by utilisation of
the surface pressure, which is set up by the wind and which
produces a restoring moment about the yaw axis.
 For upwind turbines, this usually requires a tail vane in
order to work properly.
 A passive yaw system may pose a problem in terms of cable
twisting if the turbine keeps yawing in the same direction
for a long time.
 An active yaw system employs a mechanism of hydraulic or
electrically driven motors and gearboxes to yaw the turbine
and keep it turned against the wind.
 Most large horizontal axis wind turbines use forced yaw to
align the rotor axis with the wind. 46
 MAIN SHAFT
 Shafts are cylindrical elements
designed transfer torque through
rotation.
 Transfers rotational energy from
the rotor hub to the gearbox or
directly to the generator
 Supported by roller bearings and
/ or shrink discs on both the ends.
 Forged steel
 Generally centre bored (hollow-
shaft)
 To reduce its weight and at the
same time to allow the hydraulic
/elecrical power circuits and pitch
system components to pass
through for the blade pitching
systems situated in the hub
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 MAIN GEARBOX
 Mechanical Energy available at a
low rpm – needs to be step-up to
higher rpm suitable for generators.
 Gearbox
 To step up the speed of rotor
rotation to a speed suitable for
the generator
 A complete assembly of gears,
shafts, bearings, housing, seals,
lubrication system and
associated components.
 Design requires careful
consideration of load spectrum,
size and weight
 GEAR ARRANGEMENTS
 To achieve the increased speed,
generally wind turbine gearbox
employs parallel axis gears i.e.,
external spur, helical or annulus
(internal) gears.
 simplest arrangement within a
stage consists of two external gears
meshing with each other and is
commonly referred to as ‘parallel
shaft’.
 A ring of planet gears mounted on a
planet carrier and meshing with a
sun gear on the inside and an
annulus gear on the outside. -
‘epicyclic’
 The sun and planets are external
gears and the annulus is an
internal gear as its teeth are on the
inside.
MAIN GEARBOX

50
TYPICAL 3 STAGE GEARBOX

51
 LUBRICATION SYSTEM
 According to ISO 81400-4 (Wind turbines – design
and specification of gearboxes), minimum quantity of
oil in the lubrication system should be: (These
recommendations are based on experience with
typical multistage gearboxes where the gear housing
forms the oil reservoir)

52
 CONTROL & PROTECTION SYSTEM
 A primary function of the control system is to
maintain the machine operating parameters
within their normal limits.
 The purpose of the safety system (also referred as
‘protection system’) is to ensure that, should a
critical operating parameter exceed its normal
limit as a result of a fault or failure in the wind
turbine or the control system, the machine is
maintained in a safe condition.
 Normally the critical operating parameters are:
Turbine rotational speed.
Power output.
Vibration level.
53
Twist of pendant cables running up into nacelle.
ADVANCED CONTROLS FOR LOADS
REDUCTION

 Drive Train damping

 Tower fore-aft damping

 Tower sideways damping

 Blade load reduction

54
 TOWER
 It raises turbine up into the air.
 Most towers are made of steel and/or concrete.
As far as steel constructions are concerned,
besides the lattice towers there are also tubular
steel towers; the latter being the most common
tower type applied nowadays.
 Types of Towers 1)Lattice tower. 2). Tubular
Tower 3). Concrete tower 4) Hybrid Tower
 Another key factor regarding tower dimensions
and design is the natural vibration of the tower-
nacelle-rotor overall system in view of the
prevention of dangerous resonance, particularly
during rotor startup.
 Soft-Soft Tower, Soft Tower, Stiff Tower
 Further influencing factors are dimensions and
weight regarding transport requirements and
thus available roads, erection methods, cranes
and accessibility of the nacelle as well as long-
term properties such as weathering resistance
and material fatigue. 55
 MODERN WIND TURBINES
 Types of Generator available:
 SCIG
 DFIG
 EESG
 PMSG

 Five different concepts:

 A - doubly-fed induction generator system with three-stage gearbox (DFIG 3G)
 B - electrically excited direct-drive synchronous generator system (EESG DD)
 C - PM excited direct-drive synchronous generator system (PMSG DD)
 D - PM excited synchronous generator system with single-stage gearbox (PMSG 1G)
 E - the doubly-fed induction generator system with single-stage gearbox (DFIG 1G)
 Based on the above quantitative comparisons, some conclusion between the geared drive and the direct-drive
wind generators can be drawn as follows.
• From the aspects of size and weight, the outer diameter of the direct-drive generator is usually larger than
the geared-drive generator, but the total length is shorter.
• Considering the parts of wind turbine blade, the total system weight of wind turbines is almost similar
between a three-stage geared-drive configuration and a direct-drive PMSG solution. As far as the costs are
concerned, the direct-drive PMSG technology is almost in the same range as the geared-drive DFIG
configuration, the direct-drive EESG is more expensive.
• The DFIG 1G is the most promising choice from the viewpoints of total generator cost and energy yield per
cost.
• For direct-drive wind turbine topologies, PMSG DD is the better choice than EESG DD, but the Multibrid
type of PMSG 1G has a better performance than PMSG DD from the viewpoints of total generator cost and
energy yield per cost.


56
 COMPONENT CLASS
 Component class 1:
used for "fail-safe" structural components whose failure
does not result in the failure of a major part of a wind
turbine, for example replaceable bearings with monitoring.

 Component class 2:
used for "non fail-safe" structural components whose
failures may lead to the failure of a major part of a wind
turbine.

 Component class 3:
used for “non fail-safe” mechanical components that link
actuators and brakes to main structural components for the
purpose of implementing non-redundant wind turbine 57
protection functions described in 8.3.
RAW MATERIALS
 A wide range of materials are used for wind turbine
construction. Steel is one of the most important materials
because of its strength and durability.
 Turbines are primarily made of steel, which accounts for
90% of the machine by weight.
 A single 1 MW utility scale wind turbine tower is
constructed from an estimated 100 tons of steel, and larger
turbines use a significantly greater amount of steel.
 The rotor is constructed from approximately 45% steel,
with the hub being made of 100% steel, and the blades
being made up of 2% steel and a combination of fiberglass
(78%) and adhesive (15%). Steel accounts for between 87%
and 92% of nacelle components (American Wind Energy
Association, 2009).
RAW MATERIALS
 A wide range of materials are used for wind turbine
construction. Steel is one of the most important materials
because of its strength and durability.
 Turbines are primarily made of steel, which accounts for
90% of the machine by weight.
 A single 1 MW utility scale wind turbine tower is
constructed from an estimated 100 tons of steel, and larger
turbines use a significantly greater amount of steel.
 The rotor is constructed from approximately 45% steel,
with the hub being made of 100% steel, and the blades
being made up of 2% steel and a combination of fiberglass
(78%) and adhesive (15%). Steel accounts for between 87%
and 92% of nacelle components (American Wind Energy
Association, 2009).
 WIND TURBINE MARKINGS
As per IEC 61400-1, the following information, as a minimum, shall be
prominently and legibly displayed on the indelibly marked turbine
nameplate:
 wind turbine manufacturer and country;

 model and serial number;

 production year;`

 rated power;

 reference wind speed, Vref;

 hub height operating wind speed range, Vin – Vout;

 operating ambient temperature range;

 IEC wind turbine class;

 rated voltage at the wind turbine terminals;

 frequency at the wind turbine terminals or frequency range in the case 60

that the nominal variation is greater than 2 %.
 SUMMARY
 Design Life Time
 Materials used for Wind Turbines

 Wind Turbine Class

 Component Class

 International Standard for Wind Turbine

 Load Cases for Wind Turbines – Design

Situations
 Types of Wind Turbine Loads

 Betz Limit

 Variable Speed Pitch Regulation

61
 SUMMARY
 Tip Speed Ratio and Power Coefficient
 Steady State Power Curve & Measured Power
Curve
 Design Evaluation / Design Assessment (With
respect to Type Certification of Wind Turbines)
 Numerical Modeling of Wind Turbines and Codes
for Loads Estimation
 Reference Wind Speed and Extreme Wind Speed /
Survival Wind Speed

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THANK YOU
63