The Problem with Wind Energy

Wind turbine service technician here, actually modern machines doesnt need to achieve 1500-1800 rpm to produce power, thanks to the converter system its possible to start producing usable power as low as around 900-1000 rpm (about 3.5 / 4 m/s of wind on 150m diameter machines at max blade pitch angle). The way its done is simply to lower the voltage frequency on the generator side of the converters (while keeping 50/60Hz on the grid side). The 1500-1800 range is now more of a "max power" range if the wind speed is high enough (4.2MW for a Vestas V150 MK3E for example, at about 11m/s). About the maintenance on gearboxes in fact there is not really much to do most of the time, as soon as the service is correctly done (filter changes, oil levels) they can last more than the 7 years you are speaking without any issues. Of course gearboxes problems are possible, but they are pretty rare compared to the quantity of machines.

I procrastinate studying actual engineering by watching real engineer videos.

Thanks for the video, but it's a bit outdated. Wind turbines nowadays have better power control systems that allow the "inertia" effect and allow 50/60Hz output and variable speed without all of the power going through an inverter. The gearbox has a design life equivalent to the turbine's design life (15 years in France generally). On a turbine from REpower I worked on, the flowing was built -in: - It has a winded rotor. No permanent magnets requiring rare earth. - At partial load (low wind): partial load variable speed wind turbines (VSWT) utilize a method where the rotor operates at variable speeds while maintaining a constant 50Hz output on the stator. This is achieved through the injection of variable frequency current into the rotor, which is controlled to match the desired output frequency on the stator side. - At full load (high wind), the pitch changes depending the wind speed and grid frequency to maintain the 50Hz - VSWT can provide an emulated inertial response by using the kinetic energy stored in the rotating mass of the turbine. This is similar to the inertial response provided by traditional synchronous generators. When there is a sudden drop in grid frequency, the turbines can quickly inject additional power to the grid, helping to stabilize the frequency. During frequency drops, the turbine can temporarily operate in overproduction mode, generating more power than its mechanical input by using stored kinetic energy. This rapid power injection helps to counteract the frequency drop. After the frequency stabilizes, the turbine can reduce its output to recover its rotational speed and maintain optimal operating conditions.

The comments are as educational as the video. This is not a criticisism. It is encouragement to read the comments. This is the first really interesting video I have seen on wind power, good job.

The people turning on kettles for tea during ad breaks at 5:45 is probably the most british thing I have ever heard.

Im an offshore wind turbine technician in the US. the platform i work on is a direct drive, no gearbox needed. Those generators are fascinating bits of tech.

Northern Ireland resident here, currently sitting maybe a few hundred metres away from a wind turbine. Great to hear about a topic like this that's right in my back yard (well, in the farmer's field next door). I had noticed a lot more wind turbines appearing across the countryside in recent years - didn't know that the island of Ireland had so much more wind than the average.

I completed my masters degree on direct drive power converters a decade ago. The inertia of the turbine is absolutely still present even if not directly synchronised to the grid. Under a surge the controller can have the inverter match the grid demand and slow the turbine down by drawing more power from it than it is currently producing. In fact at the time I was studying it I was informed of techniques to allow the turbines to spin faster storing more energy in inertia if a surge is predicted overriding the MPPT algorithm. It’s not too dissimilar to how battery storage is being used to stabilise the grid

Mechanical design engineer of windturbine gearboxes here. I can say that the section of the gearboxes is not 100% correct. Yes the sensitieve part of the gearbox are the bearings, in particular the high speed shaft. But a lot of development is done in the bearing and bearing arrangement to reduce these failures to max 5-10 in a popultion of 1000. Also current gearboxed exist of 2 or even 3 planetary stages. These are just a few things

Currently working on turbines that are 20+ years old. Sure bearings and gearboxes go bad but these things crank out energy like it’s going out of style. And modern turbines are making power from 750rpm all the way up to 1500+ so the wind window is much wider than they used to be. Even the old ones I work on make power at 820rpm. In fact we normally are flagged for making too much and have to shut some towers off on high wind days.

The wind flows off the Scottish coast are the greatest, most consistent in Europe. We also have pumped storage in Scotland where water is pumped up during low energy usage times , then released down when energy is required. Wind turbines do not need replacement every 7 years. It’s just a big generator and there are thousands of industrial models used far more heavily without issue in powers stations worldwide.

lol you know you’ve got quite the audience, when you’re first ten comments are ‘I work in this’, ‘I invented that’… 👍🏻

little fun fact: enercon brand wind turbines (the ones wich have a egg shaped top housing and are very recognizable at 0:24) are the only widely used turbines w/o a gearbox, they instead have a large "pancake" style generator wich does not need any gears and is made specifically to generate peak power at the lower RPM the blades spin at its also why the housing is egg shaped edit: enercon recently celebrated 40 years and their first direct drive turbine, the E-40 was developed in the early 90s direct drive is nothing new, nothing that needs to "prove itself", its been proven and reliable for over 30 years now

That's hilarious to know an entire county's electrical grid can be tripped by people watching TV and all getting up to make tea at the same time.

The Haliade-X is not the largest turbine, that's either the Siemens Gamesa 14 (14MW) the Dongfang Electric DEW-18 (18MW)

What I love: In most channels, a title like this prompts hundreds of totally uninformed comments about why wind power doesn't work. Here, you get lots of comments by actual engineers who know what they are talking about, giving real-world insights into specific issues

I know someone who works for a company developing HVDC links to connect country grids together, really cool tech. Maybe a video about HVDC can be a good complimentary video to this one.

8:15 is that a FULL BRIDGE RECTIFIER?!?!!!11!!1

The flywheel you refer to is called a Synchronous Condenser. We have a lot of them in the U.S. You disconnect the old steam turbine from the generator and attach a starting motor. You spin the generator up to synchronous speed and synch it to the grid, and then disconnect it from the starting motor. It uses power from the grid to continue running. You then have the spinning mass required to help stabilize the grid. This is currently the best means of voltage and frequency stabilization for all the renewable energy coming on line.

Nuclear for Australia confirmed