Comments on: Germany’s REpower to Upgrade Blyth Wind Farm with 23.8 MW of New Turbines

By: Germany's REpower to Upgrade Blyth Wind Farm with 23.8 MW of … » greennewstweets.com

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 17:41:04 +0000

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By: Muchos Huevos

Muchos Huevos — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:09:00 +0000

I am glad these people have been helping themselves with solar and wind thechnology, hope they may rediscover Mr. Tesla’s Power Tower.

By: Ben Courtice

Ben Courtice — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 09:31:00 +0000

I would expect the rotor size (by which I presume you mean the overall diameter of the swept area of the blades) would increase significantly with the larger model turbine. Obviously, having a taller tower makes it possible to have much longer blades without coming too close to the ground. Certainly, newer turbines have considerably longer blades than these old ones. I’m not sure why you decided to assume a fixed rotor size?

Also, a higher turbine catches a better wind stream (less turbulence etc at greater height). And finally, using less turbine foundation/infrastructure per megawatt is also significant in an onshore environment – and the host farmer can continue to use more land for farming, as well as the lower construction costs.

By: Mike_branney

Mike_branney — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:02:00 +0000

Came across this post and simply had to comment. The net benefit from moving from a tower height of 40m to 80m is much less than half for a fixed rotor size. You will find that the cost of the added tower height is not far off a direct trade-off. It is rotor active area and turbine operation that really dictates energy capture. However, economics comes down to the increase in energy capture against cost. Unfortunately the square cubed power law (Galileo) means that unless you can use some new techniques/technology to get this increase in size you will always have a net decrease in economy! The main benefit in an offshore environment is the fact that you only need one foundation and infrastructure (~40pc of total cost) for said 3.4MW machine compared to 11 smaller machines. As the old adage says, larger is not necessarily better =) – Mike, PhD Wind Energy Doctoral Training Centre, Strathclyde.