Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy Systems
The intelligent and optimized condition monitoring leads to higher energy yields in the wind farm.
Reliability, monitoring, and yield analysis: How IWES significantly boosts the efficiency of offshore wind farms
In the course of several publicly funded projects, Fraunhofer IWES in collaboration with partners has been able to build up a unique field database of failure and operating data from wind turbines worldwide. This collection facilitates boosting the reliability of turbine components, reducing costs and risks, performing OPEX modeling and cost-benefit analyses, and testing methods for early fault detection. In addition, IWES runs computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for the protection of flexible rotor blades, which make it possible to identify and reduce the blades’ susceptibility to vibrations – for example when the turbine is at a standstill or in trundle mode. For highly efficient project and risk management, IWES also offers project plan and weather risk analyses in order to assess potential risks at an early stage. IWES evaluates the performance and efficiency of existing offshore wind farms by means of post-construction and performance analyses. The portfolio also encompasses optimized maintenance concepts, the assessment of existing concepts, and the optimization of the O&M logistics, in order to develop tailored, cost-efficient solutions.
Our areas of expertise
Technical reliability
Better understanding and improvement of O&M activities
Fraunhofer IWES boasts many years of success in publicly funded projects on the topics of the reliability of power converters, root cause analysis, condition monitoring, and the digitalization of O&M data. In addition, IWES also has considerable experience in O&M modeling, cost-benefit analysis, and the optimization of O&M strategies on the basis of field data.
Further information in the data sheet: Understanding and improving O&M activities
More reliable wind turbine components and better OPEX modeling input thanks to unrivaled collection of field data
Many years of research have enabled IWES to build up extensive expertise in the investigation of causes of failure of wind turbine components. This is performed in close cooperation with stakeholders from all areas of the value chain. The aim when doing so is to improve reliability and reduce both costs and the associated risks.
IWES has generated an extensive, continuously growing collection of field data from more than 10,000 wind turbines in projects. Thanks to its size, diversity, and up-to-dateness, this data set is unique and it spans a wide range of turbine age classes, manufacturers, and installation sites. On the basis of this data set, IWES supplies reliability data for OPEX modeling and cost-benefit analysis. In addition, IWES also offers solutions for early fault detection and conducts failure cause analyses.
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Current status and key characteristics of the
Fraunhofer IWES field data set
Certification I Accreditation
Yield and site assessment
Wind field modeling: Multiscale simulation of wind and wake effects
The expansion of wind energy is taking place under different environmental conditions all around the world. Whereas wind farms are increasingly being planned and constructed in very complex terrain on land (onshore), large “power plants” with hundreds of wind turbines are being installed at sea (offshore), where they interact with the marine atmospheric boundary layer (MABL). The challenges in the numerical simulation and assessment of the sites are correspondingly different.
The modeling of wind fields is primarily required to supplement wind measurement and yield data in space and time as well as for the simulation of future planning conditions. Fraunhofer IWES has been active in the further development, improvement, and application of numerical methods and data sets on all relevant scales for more than a decade, employing open source models and methods in particular.
The numerical simulation of wind energy sites requires the application of different methods in order to satisfy the industry’s requirements on precision and speed as well as to adapt precisely to the various associated scales. To this end, Fraunhofer IWES has developed a range of different numerical site assessment tools for the calculation of wind fields and wind farm yields in complex terrain geometries and the calculation of wind turbines and wind farm wakes in recent years.
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Modeling of wind energy sites in complex terrain
The modeling of complex sites with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) methods first requires the generation of suitable meshes, as the quality of the results depends highly on them. For this purpose, IWES has been developing the terrainMesher mesh generator, which is capable of projecting high-quality grids onto even large sites in very complex terrain automatically, since 2012. On the basis of the open source tool OpenFOAM, a number of parametrizations and flow solvers for the simulation of wind turbines, forest effects, and the atmospheric stability have been developed and validated in a variety of projects, and methods for the calculation of uncertainties have been implemented.
Together, terrainMesher, OpenFOAM, and Fraunhofer IWES’ own developments in OpenFOAM form the FIWind tool: FIWind is a fully automatic software solution which can be run on high-performance computers (HPCs) or on the cloud and controlled via a web frontend. It is an industry-suitable modeling tool for the efficient and precise calculation of wind fields, wind time series, and yields of turbines in complex terrain.
Multiscale modeling of wakes
With the advancing expansion of wind energy in large wind farms and wind farm clusters (predominantly offshore in Europe), the consequences of wind turbine wake effects on each other are playing an ever-greater role. Various studies – including some with Fraunhofer IWES’ involvement – have shown that wake effects can extend up to and beyond 100 km offshore. The wake effects on these scales can be visualized via mesoscale simulations in which the wind farm effects are parametrized. Fraunhofer IWES has been cooperating with partners to drive forward the development and validation of these parametrizations for a number of years already.
IWES has employed this modeling approach to calculate expansion scenarios and large-scale wake effects for a range of clients.
The open source industry model FOXES (Farm Optimization and eXtended yield Evaluation Software), with which wind farms have already been planned in different offshore regions, has been developed for the detailed planning of wind farm areas and their optimization since 2012. Coupled with mesoscale modeling, it is possible to map coastal effects and long-range wake effects extending over different scales.
Certification I Accreditation
Offshore logistics
Project and risk management for offshore wind farms: minimizing costs and boosting efficiency
Efficient project and risk management forms the basis for the successful and cost-efficient planning, installation, and operation of offshore wind farms. In the planning and execution phase, IWES offers project plan and weather risk analyses for early identification and assessment of potential risks. Its expertise means that IWES can help to minimize risks and optimize the efficiency of the project logistics.
Post-construction and performance analyses allow assessment of the performance and efficiency of already installed offshore wind farms. IWES can then make suggestions for optimization on the basis of the results. With the conceptual design of maintenance concepts for offshore wind farms and the evaluation of existing concepts, IWES contributes to finding the optimal operating strategy for wind farms and minimizing costs.
In addition, IWES offers the optimization of the O&M logistics in order to render the operation and maintenance of the offshore wind farms more efficient. IWES analyzes the logistics processes and develops customized solutions for maximizing the availability of the turbines and optimizing the O&M costs.
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Reducing the energy production costs of offshore wind farms with targeted strategies
The installation and operating concepts of offshore wind farms are improved via the evaluation and development of concepts and future-oriented methods. This aim is achieved through the use of innovative in-house software tools, with which the installation and the entire life cycle of an offshore wind farm can be mapped and analyzed in detailed time series simulations.
The developed software tools identify potential problems and risks presenting during the installation and operation of an offshore wind farm, especially weather risks. IWES can then employ the knowledge gained to develop strategies for evaluating and analyzing these risks. Recommendations for action are then derived from these analyses, which contribute to optimizing offshore wind farms in terms of efficiency and costs.
The acquired knowledge of the installation and operating concepts and their associated risks for offshore wind farms can be utilized to reduce the farms’ energy production costs. In addition, the provision of extremely detailed simulations of offshore wind farms enables the software tools to deliver a wide range of other (key) performance indicators.
OffshoreTIMES Operation and Maintenance Simulation Tool - Input-Output-Structure
Certification I Accreditation
