Puncture position on wind turbine blades and arc path evolution under lightning strikes

Wind blades are major structural elements of wind turbines, but they are prone to damage like any other composite component. Blade damage can cause sudden structural failure and the associated costs to repair them are high. Therefore, it is important to identify the causation of damage to prevent defects during the manufacturing phase, transportation, and in operation. Generally, damage in wind blades can arise due to manufacturing defects, precipitation and debris, water ingress, variable loading due to wind, operational errors, lightning strikes, and fire. Early detection and mitigation techniques are required to avoid or reduce damage in costly wind turbine blades. This article provides an extensive review of viable solutions and approaches for damage mitigation in wind turbine blades.

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Investigating the energy handling capability of low voltage surge arresters in a wind farm under direct lightning strikes on wind turbine blades

2014 IEEE PES General Meeting | Conference & Exposition ◽

10.1109/pesgm.2014.6938781 ◽

2014 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Newman Malcolm ◽

Raj Aggarwal

Keyword(s):

Wind Turbine ◽

Wind Farm ◽

Low Voltage ◽

Turbine Blades ◽

Wind Turbine Blades ◽

Lightning Strikes ◽

Surge Arresters

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Electrical and thermal performance of different core materials applied in wind turbine blades under lightning strikes

Wind Energy ◽

10.1002/we.2392 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 22 (11) ◽

pp. 1603-1621 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Jiangyan Yan ◽

Guozheng Wang ◽

Yufei Ma ◽

Zixin Guo ◽

Hanwen Ren ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Wind Turbine ◽

Thermal Performance ◽

Turbine Blades ◽

Wind Turbine Blades ◽

Lightning Strikes ◽

Core Materials

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Study on Improvement of Lightning Damage Detection Model for Wind Turbine Blade

Machines ◽

10.3390/machines10010009 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 9

Author(s):

Takuto Matsui ◽

Kazuo Yamamoto ◽

Jun Ogata

Keyword(s):

Damage Detection ◽

Wind Turbine ◽

Wind Turbines ◽

Detection System ◽

Turbine Blades ◽

Lightning Strike ◽

Wind Turbine Blades ◽

Lightning Strikes ◽

Detection Model ◽

Secondary Damage

There have been many reports of damage to wind turbine blades caused by lightning strikes in Japan. In some of these cases, the blades struck by lightning continue to rotate, causing more serious secondary damage. To prevent such accidents, it is a requirement that a lightning detection system is installed on the wind turbine in areas where winter lightning occurs in Japan. This immediately stops the wind turbine if the system detects a lightning strike. Normally, these wind turbines are restarted after confirming soundness of the blade through visual inspection. However, it is often difficult to confirm the soundness of the blade visually for reasons such as bad weather. This process prolongs the time taken to restart, and it is one of the causes that reduces the availability of the wind turbines. In this research, we constructed a damage detection model for wind turbine blades using machine learning based on SCADA system data and, thereby, considered whether the technology automatically confirms the soundness of wind turbine blades.

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Lightning Protection Methods for Wind Turbine Blades: An Alternative Approach

Applied Sciences ◽

10.3390/app10062130 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (6) ◽

pp. 2130

Author(s):

Viktor Mucsi ◽

Ahmad Syahrir Ayub ◽

Firdaus Muhammad-Sukki ◽

Muhammad Zulkipli ◽

Mohd Nabil Muhtazaruddin ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Wind Turbine ◽

Turbine Blades ◽

Lightning Strike ◽

Lightning Protection ◽

Wind Turbine Blades ◽

New Approach ◽

Lightning Strikes ◽

Tall Structures ◽

Alternative Approach ◽

Hybrid Conductor

Lightning strikes happens in a fraction of time, where they can transfer huge amounts of charge and high currents in a single strike. The chances for a structure to be struck by lightning increases as the height increases; thus, tall structures are more prone to lightning. Despite the existing lightning protection systems available for wind turbine blades, there are still many cases reported due to the fact of damage caused by lightning strike. Owing to that, the present work introduces a new approach for a lightning protection system for wind turbine blades where preliminary investigations were done using Analysis Systems (ANSYS) Workbench. Two models were developed: one with a conventional type down conductor system and the other with a hybrid conductor system. The recorded findings have been compared and discussed, where it was found that the hybrid conductor system may provide alternative protection from lightning for wind turbine blades.

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