vol. 15

29 June 2023

GEVI’S FUTURE: FLOATING OFF-SHORE

By Edoardo Simonelli, Eleonora Cacchio

The potential of offshore wind power is well known, but the complexity of installation and maintenance processes poses significant challenges.

The main issue lies in the foundations. The sea floor’s depths below 50 meters prevents the installation of wind farms far from land where they could take advantage of wind intensity at higher altitudes and latitudes.

In recent years, new designs for offshore wind power systems on floating platforms are being developed to be able to produce energy on the deep sea. However, this is not yet a competitive solution since the cost of the floating offshore platform increases as the size of the unit it supports grows and as the height of the wind unit’s center of mass rises.

In other words, the tall rotor height of traditional wind turbines (HAWT) requires large floating platforms to balance the center of mass and prevent the structure from capsizing during extreme weather conditions.

The future of offshore wind power definitely remains on floating platforms, and GEVI turbines are perfect to make it happen!

Firstly, their lightweight structure and low center of mass greatly reduce the minimum size of platforms needed to support them and simplify maintenance processes. Moreover, the gyroscopic effect around the vertical axis helps to stabilize the balance of the turbines.

In addition, it is possible to install multiple turbines close together and create “energy islands” in deep sea with improving their overall productivity and sharing the power electronic optimizing also the energy distribution process. Artificial intelligence (A.I.) and active blade pitch control enable interconnection between turbines; they will exchange data with each other and proactively adapt to strong sea winds, enhancing their performance.

L'articolo GEVI’S FUTURE: FLOATING OFF-SHORE proviene da GEVI.

vol. 14

25 May 2023

OFFSHORE WIND POWER DEVELOPMENT 

By Edoardo Simonelli, Eleonora Cacchio

Only 12% of European wind power capacity is currently offshore, i.e., installed on the seabed or floating on the deep sea and connected to submarine power lines to conduct electricity to the distribution grid.

That’s because the installation, operation and maintenance costs of offshore wind farms are far higher than onshore of installations, just think of the differences between transporting by land and by sea the equipment needed to perform any kind of maintenance operation on the wind turbine. In addition, offshore systems are subject to a greater rate of erosion or risk of damage due to wave action and strong winds that develop during storms. 

Technological and engineering improvements in the last few years have made it possible to increase the reliability of the blades by reducing some of the maintenance costs, but we are still a long way from the true “green revolution” that would take place if governments incentivized the development of offshore wind power. 

With 11.700 square kilometers of coastline, Italy is particularly well-suited for the deployment of this technology, which is the basis for national energy renewal according to the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC).

In particular, at least 900 MW of offshore wind farms are planned to be installed to achieve the 2030 climate and energy targets.  

The first offshore wind power installation in the Mediterranean Sea, which is called Beleolico, has a capacity of 30 MW and was inaugurated on 21 April 2022 off the coast of Taranto. It can cover the annual energy needs of about 60.000 households by producing 58.000 MWh/year and will save 730.000 tons of carbon dioxide over the next 25 years according to experts. 

What are the main reasons that drove the attention of national governments to offshore wind power? Certainly, its advantages over onshore wind power, such as:

• the greater reliability of the energy source since offshore, where there is no obstacle whatsoever, the wind is stronger and more constant than onshore;  
• the lower environmental and noise impact since the wind turbines are located beyond the visible horizon line. 

L'articolo OFFSHORE WIND POWER DEVELOPMENT proviene da GEVI.