Like most complex machines, manufacturing a modern wind turbine is the story of materials, processes, and trends. The material story is mostly of composites. For instance, blades in particular are manufactured from fiberglass in an infusion process that excludes air. For other tasks, interest has been on a tooling resin and closed molding because the [...]
Wind-turbine manufacturer Nordex has been awarded a contract by project developer ABO Wind to construct two more wind farms with a total of 13, N117/2400 onshore turbines. Located in the German regions of Central Hesse and Franconia, the planned farms will go on grid this year after project financing is finalised. With two wind farms [...]
One aim of the ERD3 is to produce and promote a comprehensive set of recommendations for the next U.S. administration to accelerate the development and deployment of low-carbon-energy technologies. The project has three primary goals: Develop a way to assess opportunities in energy research, development, and demonstration (ERD&D) investment and producing a set of comprehensive [...]
A new geospatial application developed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) lets users easily and accurately map potential renewable energy resources in the U.S. The interactive tool, RE Atlas, is free to use and available online at http://maps.nrel.gov/re_atlas. “Ease of use and breadth of data make RE Atlas an excellent [...]
Design firms run on engineering and support software. One recent announcement reported on an OEM and engineering software firm teaming up to develop what might be called TurbineCAD. The final product has not been announced. Programs worth noting (and available) to the wind industry simulate the myriad of conditions a wind farm is likely to [...]
Keeping the wide variety of machinery in a nacelle operating at peak performance requires a few test and measurement tools. On the mechanical side, vibration and alignment tests, are frequent tasks. Vibration has been a knotty problem because the location and operation of wind turbines made them “immune” to international vibration standards. According to DIN [...]
The growth in the size of wind turbines and their components have negatively affected America’s transportation industry. The wind industry has pushed high-load permits to high numbers. Four to five truck loads are needed for each turbine. By one count in 2009, 22,000 truck loads were needed to ship 5,000 wind turbines. Even a small [...]
The developer and manufacturer of hydrogen generation and fuel cell products has announced a contract with Ballast Nedam IPM, awarded at the end of December 2011, to supply a HySTAT30 electrolyzer for integration into a Netherlands’ based hydrogen fueling station. The owner of the fueling station will be Waterstofnet, a non-profit organization financed by the [...]
Adrian Langford is General Manager of the Process Burner Division at Lanemark International Ltd. who have been at the forefront of process gas burner design and installation since the early 1980s. He believes there are a number of steps that could be considered and taken – either via converting existing ‘point of use’ systems or replacing centralised facilities – which can help to mitigate against the new energy cost environment in which, he says, UK manufacturing must now operate. The rapid increase in energy prices is exercising minds both in the home and in the factory. On the domestic front the consistent suggestion from the media is to ‘shop around’ to ensure that the price paid for each kW of gas and electricity consumed is reduced to the minimum possible. Sensible advice, but while this pursuit of the best energy deal can lead to reductions in the amount of money that has to be spent, in industry it is only part of the story. Here, the real key is to reduce the total number of kWh that are used in manufacturing applications by critically appraising existing process heating methods in order to maximise operating efficiencies while, at the same time, identifying the optimum energy source for each process.
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