Sany Renewable Energy, a China-based manufacturer of wind turbines, has rolled out the SY1310A turbine blades measuring 430 feet (131 m) long turbine blades from its Bayannur Intelligent Industrial Park, a company press release said. These are the longest-ever turbine blades used for onshore wind farm facilities.
With the world looking for improved and efficient ways of harnessing wind energy, larger turbines that can sweep greater areas and generate more power in a single sweep are now in demand. European turbine maker Vestas has already unveiled its 15 MW rating turbine with blades measuring 378 feet (115.5 m) for offshore wind farms.
Sany’s new turbine blade is expected to be used for its 10 MW turbines at an onshore facility in Germany. It makes them the longest blades on land. Another China-based company, MingYang, has also unveiled its 459-foot (140 m) long blades for its proposed 18 MW turbine, which are currently the longest publicly known blades in the world.
New design for new challenges
As wind turbines get longer, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are now facing a new set of difficulties. Longer blades need to be stronger and stiffer, failing, which can cause them to undergo flutter, which can even break the blade in extreme cases. Flutter combines aerodynamic forces on the blade and torsional deflections at disruptive angles, which can cause blades to twist.
To address concerns of flutter, Sany used an optimized airfoil design, which includes a blunt trailing edge and greater thickness for the blade. To improve the reliability of the blade, the company also used carbon fiber instead of glass fiber on the spar cap while adding reinforcements on the trailing edge, Recharge News reported.
In its press release, Sany said that, unlike conventional approaches, which involve manually laying fiberglass cloth to mold the blade, the company used digital technology in key areas to improve operation standards and product quality.
Advantages of digital technology
Interesting Engineering has previously reported how increased 5G adoption in China is propelling manufacturing in the country into a new age. Sany’s description of its manufacturing processes also shows how advantageous digital technology is in production.
The company has achieved a nearly zero percent failure rate in its prefabrication processes while also speeding up the construction time. The press release claimed that the automation of the resin infusion process makes intake, storage, and use of resin easier while improving perfusion efficiency by as much as 25 percent.
Post-treatment processes are also completely automated and are monitored using digital-twin technology using Internet of Things (IoT) sensors that help create a virtual factory that can be supervised digitally.
The press release added that These changes have improved the factory efficiency by 20 percent overall while reducing the construction period for blades above 328 feet (100 m) from 40 to 30 hours.
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The 430-foot-long blade will now enter a long testing phase before being deployed on the 15 MW wind turbines SANY plans to deploy onshore. Currently deployed onshore wind turbines have a power rating of no more than 5MW. So, a 15 MW turbine would be a major leap for onshore wind farms.
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Ameya Paleja Ameya is a science writer based in Hyderabad, India. A Molecular Biologist at heart, he traded the micropipette to write about science during the pandemic and does not want to go back. He likes to write about genetics, microbes, technology, and public policy.