Abstract
The drivetrain as an important part of wind turbines needs to be improved in order to deal with today’s high development and cost pressure. One important step towards enhanced drivetrains is to identify the most suitable concept for a targeted onshore application in an early design stage. With this purpose, a holistic lifecycle system evaluation approach relying on minimum input information is presented. In order to identify a dominant solution, an additive target system is defined taking cost, ecological sustainability, and supplied energy into account. This multi-criteria decision is aggregated by defining a macrosocial evaluation criterion: “drivetrain specific energy supply effort”. A physics- and empirically-based model is developed to quantify the targets for different onshore drivetrain concepts. The validity of the model results is shown by a comparison to meta-analysis findings. Being utilized on a drivetrain concept comparison between geared and direct drive the approach’s value is showcased. Both concepts score on a comparable level slightly differing in weak and strong wind regimes. An exemplary trade-off between investment- and operational effort shows, that for both concepts the investment effort is higher than the operational. The comparison furthermore shows how robust decision support can be provided by parameter variation and finally it stresses, that the decision maker’s preferences need to be incorporated in the decision. Concluding, this analysis shows that physics- and empirically-based model approaches enable holistic wind turbine drivetrain concept comparisons in an early design stage.
Highlights
Wind and solar power play an important role in realizing the German energy transition [1]
The average bid awarded in the German onshore tendering in December 2020 was 5.91 Ct/kWh [4]. This can be used as an indicator for the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) for electricity provided by onshore wind power
Configurations, a physics- and empirically-based model is presented which can be applied in an early drivetrain concept decision [18,19,20]
Summary
Wind and solar power play an important role in realizing the German energy transition [1]. Whereas the direct drive concept waives of the component gearbox and instead needs enlarged synchronous generators, which are either permanent magnet or electrically excited They rely on a fully rated converter. They use a gearbox to increase the rotational speed but have a lower ratio than the high-speed concepts They mainly use a permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG) and need a fully rated converter. There is no approach yet available including a holistic set of criteria This means considering the entire lifecycle as well as influences of and interdependencies between different drivetrain components. Concluding literature approaches are not yet able to sufficiently support the early stage drivetrain concept decision To fill this gap the present study aims to consider the effects the drivetrain decision can have on the entire turbine’s lifecycle in one holistic approach with minimal input information.
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