Abstract
In the present study, field observation wind data from the time of the wind turbine blade damage accident on Shiratakiyama Wind Farm were analyzed in detail. In parallel, high-resolution large-eddy simulation (LES) turbulence simulations were performed in order to examine the model’s ability to numerically reproduce terrain-induced turbulence (turbulence intensity) under strong wind conditions (8.0–9.0 m/s at wind turbine hub height). Since the wind velocity and time acquired from the numerical simulation are dimensionless, they are converted to full scale. As a consequence, both the standard deviation of the horizontal wind speed (m/s) and turbulence intensity evaluated from the field observation and simulated wind data are successfully in close agreement. To investigate the cause of the wind turbine blade damage accident on Shiratakiyama Wind Farm, a power spectral analysis was performed on the fluctuating components of the observed time series data of wind speed (1 s average values) for a 10 min period (total of 600 data) by using a fast Fourier transform (FFT). It was suggested that the terrain-induced turbulence which caused the wind turbine blade damage accident on Shiratakiyama Wind Farm was attributable to rapid wind speed and direction fluctuations which were caused by vortex shedding from Tenjogadake (elevation: 691.1 m) located upstream of the wind farm.
Highlights
The number of accidents which have involved wind turbines constructed on complex terrain in the mountains is increasing rapidly
A comparison was made on the results from the simulations which used terrain elevation data with 10.0 m and 50.0 m resolutions from the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan (GSI)
200.0–300.0, time step interval: 0.002, number of data values: approximately 50,000) acquired from are dimensionless, they were converted to full scale with the procedure described below
Summary
The number of accidents which have involved wind turbines constructed on complex terrain in the mountains is increasing rapidly. Recent studies by the author of the present study and others indicate that these investigated accidents are strongly associated with terrain-induced turbulence [1,2]. In these studies, terrain-induced turbulence is defined as “temporal and spatial fluctuations of airflow that are mechanically generated due to terrain irregularities.”. The first kind is “extraordinary” terrain-induced turbulence, which is generated with the passage of a typhoon or a rarely occurring meteorological phenomena. It has been reported that this kind of terrain-induced turbulence caused a serious accident that involved cracks on the wind turbine blades and other damage [1]
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