Nantucket wind turbine failure was ‘unusual and unusual.’ But it was not the first | CNN

CNN
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A large offshore wind turbine blade that shattered fiberglass and scattered foam debris across Nantucket beaches this week was one of the latest failures by GE Vernova – America’s top wind turbine manufacturer.

Several GE Vernova blades have broken on offshore and onshore turbines in Germany, Sweden, Lithuania and the United Kingdom in recent years. The broken blades were a variety of sizes and shapes, and the company’s research revealed that there were a variety of causes of damage, including transportation, handling and deflection. of the offer, according to a company source with knowledge of the investigation.

Broken wind turbines are “rare and rare,” a GE Vernova representative told Nantucket residents and officials Wednesday. A company spokesman said in a statement that it was “working quickly to complete our investigation into the cause of this incident.”

The broken turbine is a major setback for Vineyard Wind, which had been a bright spot for the developing and struggling US offshore wind industry. The joint venture between Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners has 10 turbines in operation and plans to install 62 in total.

The federal government suspended operations and construction on the project while it conducted its own investigation into the broken blade.

While GE Vernova was at the forefront of the Nantucket failure, it is not the only wind turbine manufacturer to have had this problem, according to Indra Mukherjee, deputy director of clean energy technology research for S&P Global Commodity Insights.

“It is clear that the major (producers) are all facing a break in the blade,” Mukherjee said in an email. The failure was due to issues such as poor design and poor design by contractors, he said.

As the world’s wind energy industry grows, so do the size of the turbines themselves. But Mukherjee says going up that fast also comes with “huge engineering challenges,” with emerging blades posing a “huge risk.”

Last year, three GE Vernova blades broke at the Alfstedt-Ebersdorf offshore wind farm in Germany. An independent investigation into the incident is ongoing and will probably not be completed until later this year, according to Julia Pschribülla, a spokesperson for the farm’s developer, Energiekontor.

Pschribülla said the wind park will not be operational until the investigation is complete and they have found that “other turbines of the same type are not at risk of comparable damage.”

Wind turbine blades, made of fiberglass, wood, foam and carbon fiber, must withstand all kinds of harsh weather conditions and constant wear and tear, according to Mukherjee. In addition, most of the large turbines and blades on the market are new designs, which means that “occasional failure is inevitable as the industry moves up the learning curve, ” said Mukherjee.

The total number of broken turbine blades is reduced compared to the large number of blades manufactured each year. Wind farm manufacturers have ordered about 20,000 turbines – each with several blades – by 2023.

“If we take that as a measure, the failure rate remains low,” Mukherjee said.

After debris from a broken wind turbine prompted a beach closure, Nantucket city officials questioned the lack of communication about the dangers of broken wind turbines, compared to relating to visual impact or potential hazards to marine life.

“Personally, I never thought anything like this, I never thought we were in this kind of danger,” Nantucket board chairwoman Brooke Mohr previously told CNN.

In a statement, a GE Vernova spokeswoman said “the company’s top priority is safety and minimizing the impact of this incident on the community surrounding the Wind Farm in Massachusetts.”

The project was intended to double the number of turbines running on the East Coast, and state leaders in Massachusetts saw it as a major boost to the state’s power generation capacity. Energy analysts have recently pointed to this project and other recent industry developments as signs of wind power’s potential.

The project is now on hold, and may remain so until the federal investigation is completed.