POWER December 2014 - 34

WIND POWER
Wind Turbine Generator Maintenance:
What to Expect and Why
When most of today's wind projects were developed, first costs were the focus;
operations and maintenance (O&M) costs were largely unknown. Now,
with hundreds of turbine models in operation-sometimes at a single
site-O&M complexity is magnified, which makes understanding common
failure modes and how to prepare for handling them essential.
Kevin Alewine
O
ver the past few years, wind generation
projects have become prominent
features of the North American landscape
and of the utility infrastructure. In spite
of their variable production load onto the
grid, wind has proven to be a solid contributor
to inexpensive energy delivery.
Including current production and the
many new projects under way, U.S. wind
energy peak capacity should pass 75,000
MW nameplate capacity by the end of 2015,
according to the American Wind Energy
Association's (AWEA's) " Second Quarter
2014 Market Report. " Wind is providing a
steadily increasing share of the electricity
generated in the U.S.: 4.1% in 2013 compared
to 3.5% in 2012 and 2.9% in 2011.
That's the equivalent of 14 average nuclear
reactors or 53 average coal-fired generation
facilities. That's a lot of energy, regardless
of the source.
Developing a New Generation
Sector
The first wind generation plants were installed
in California in the 1980s, but it took
until 1999 for the industry to hit the 2,000MW
threshold. Around that time, the first
state Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPSs)
were passed, ushering in explosive growth.
The combination of the federal production
tax credit (PTC) and state RPS policies have
grown the industry 25-fold since 1999. During
2012, the U.S. wind industry installed
more than 13,000 MW, and a similar amount
is under construction for the 2014-15 timeframe,
designed to take advantage of the
2013 extension of the PTC.
It is, of course, unknown what will happen
in the future regarding federal and state
government encouragement for growth, but
there are still many growth markets that can
benefit from this low-cost energy source,
especially on a distributed basis near large
power consumers in the Northeast and the
34
Gulf Coast. Utilities are continuing to invest
in wind power, because they are interested
in a hedge against volatile fuel prices and
future carbon regulations. There are also
unopened markets, including the southeastern
U.S., that may well continue to become
more competitive as turbines are scaled up
and prices fall.
To put some perspective on the effect of
the PTC and other investment incentives that
have been available for wind and other new
energy initiatives, it is important to consider
the nature of the electricity market today
compared to how it was when today's nuclear
and coal sources were developing in the
1960s and 70s.
Many regions of the U.S. are now more
or less deregulated at either the generation
or consumer level or both, but during the
big energy construction boom starting 50
years ago, most utilities were public/private
ventures with investor ownership but
with revenues tightly controlled by various
public utility commissions. For the construction
of long transmission lines, large
coal-fired sites, and the entire nuclear
power generation fleet, funds were raised
primarily by private investments, but with
returns based on substantial rate increases
to energy consumers.
When the wind energy market was developing,
the scenario was changing, and the
U.S. Congress chose the production tax credit
scheme in 1992 as the best way to encourage
the development of this new technology
while avoiding cost increases for consumers.
The wind power industry has been on a roller
coaster of PTC expirations and reapprovals
since then, which has been a burden to investment
in new manufacturing facilities, where
boom and bust cycles are devastating.
When the PTC has been allowed to expire,
the U.S. wind industry has seen between a
75% and 93% drop in annual installations.
Nevertheless, according to the U.S. Departwww.powermag.com
ment
of Energy (DOE), domestic content
has increased dramatically in wind turbines
and their related components installed in recent
years.
All this being said, the cost of wind energy
has fallen dramatically, and wind power
is cost-competitive in many regions of the
country. The U.S. has a wide portfolio of
energy sources, and a wise path would be to
provide a balanced mix to provide low-cost,
dependable, and regionally produced electrical
energy for the foreseeable future.
This expansion of power generation capabilities
has also provided a great avenue
for corporate growth and workforce development.
As an example, Shermco Industries
has been testing, repairing, and remanufacturing
electrical systems and equipment for
utilities and industrials since 1974, long before
the development of viable wind energy.
Today the company has expanded dramatically,
in part to take advantage of emerging
energy markets, and now has 16 locations
and more than 1,100 employees in the U.S.
and Canada. Without ongoing investment in
the energy infrastructure, we wouldn't have
had that opportunity. And we are not alone.
According to AWEA statistics, there are
now more than 50,500 jobs directly related
to wind energy manufacturing, construction,
operation, and maintenance.
All of this introduction might seem a
bit distant from maintenance planning,
but understanding some of the decisions
that have been made regarding wind projects
will help explain why operations and
maintenance (O&M) is such a critical and
often underfunded segment of the industry.
In order to structure a wind project to provide
a reasonable return to investors, the
financial model of the project had to be
carefully researched and constructed, and
providing the lowest cost equipment that
met the specifications seemed like the right
thing to do.
POWER | December 2014
http://www.powermag.com

POWER December 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of POWER December 2014

Contents
POWER December 2014 - Cover1
POWER December 2014 - Cover2
POWER December 2014 - Contents
POWER December 2014 - 2
POWER December 2014 - 3
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