Reliability Testing of Wind Farm Devices Based on the Mean Time to Failures

Abstract

Nowadays, one of the main sources of renewable energy is wind energy; therefore, a wind farm’s electricity system must be effective. As a result, wind farm (WF) equipment must continuously operate without failure or damage. To achieve this, it is necessary to regularly monitor and assess the reliability of WF systems at every point of their “life”, including design, implementation, and continued use. Three key goals are presented in the article. First, a theory of fundamental theoretical quantities that can be used in reliability and maintenance analysis is presented. The second is to put forth a theoretical reliability link between mean time to failure and WF system fitness probability (Mean Time to Failures (MTTF—Mean time between failures. MTTF = t1 + t2 + … + tn/m, where: m—the number of all failures at time T, ti—i—ty time to failure)). The third goal is to analyze the time to failure as a function of service life and to assess the dependability of the WF under consideration as a function of service life. The three-state model of the WF operation process presented in the research serves as the foundation for the analytical analysis of WF reliability. The probability of fitness (Po(t)) of the WF system and the mean time to failure were calculated based on the analytical quantities denoting this model (MTTF). The WF owner can make the best choice regarding the proper WF renewal actions with the help of knowledge of these current dependability values for an in-service WF system.