Traceable mechanical and electrical power measurement for efficiency determination of wind turbines

New technologies for wind turbines are currently assessed in the field, are time-consuming to perform and highly affected by wind conditions. Shortening the time to market for these tests is one way to reduce costs and increase performance for this form of renewable energy. Indoor test benches can rapidly record a wide range of data but require accurate torque and rotational speed measurements which currently lack traceability to national standards and are difficult to make for torque measurements above 1.1 NMm.

The project assessed current methods and developed traceable methodology for torque measurements up to 5 MNm and rotational speeds up to 20 and 1600 revolutions per minute which covers the operational speeds on low-speed and high-speed shafts respectively. Standardised guidelines for traceably determining turbine efficiency on test benches will be developed along with new efficiency measurement methods for the electrical components of wind turbine nacelles. Project outputs will give a better prediction of the energy output of proposed wind parks, provide greater certainty in investments opportunities and help accelerate the transition towards cleaner energy sources.

This project builds on from EMPIR project 14IND14 MNm Torque.