In this paper a detailed technical analysis is presented for connecting three different sizes of wind farms (100, 200 and 500 MW) considering three different transmission solutions: 150 kV AC, 400 kV AC and ±150 kV VSC-HVDC. After a brief overview of the features of the possible connection solutions, the related operational aspects have been evaluated. A comparative economical assessment is mad...

Offshore wind turbine technology is moving forward as a cleaner alternative to the fossil fuelled power production. However, there are a number of challenges in offshore; wind turbines are subject to different loads that are not often experienced onshore and more importantly challenging wind and wave conditions limit the operability of the vessels needed to access offshore wind farms. As the po...

Many industries identify condition monitoring as a major opportunity to reduce maintenance costs and increase equipment availability. This is also the case for the fast emerging offshore wind turbine technology. However, when considering offshore wind turbine farms, implementation of condition monitoring also introduces a significant capital investment cost. Moreover, condition monitoring syste...

Condition monitoring (CM) systems are increasingly installed in wind turbines with the goal of providing component-specific information to wind farm operators, theoretically increasing equipment availability via maintenance and operating actions based on this information. In the offshore case, economic benefits of CM systems are often assumed to be substantial, as compared with experience of on...

In the North Sea, an array of wind profiling wind lidars were deployed mainly on offshore platforms. The purpose was to observe free stream winds at hub height. Eight lidars were validated prior to offshore deployment with observations from cup anemometers at 60, 80, 100 and 116 m on an onshore met mast situated in flat terrain. The so-called “NORSEWInD standard” for comparing lidar and mast wi...

Successful development of the offshore wind energy resource depends upon the reliability of the structures that support the electricity-generating rotor-nacelle assemblies that form the core of a wind turbine system. The risk posed to offshore wind turbines (OWTs) by extreme environmental events such as Atlantic hurricanes requires a more detailed examination of post-elastic structural performa...

Offshore wind power production is an attractive clean energy option, but the difficulty of access can lead to expensive and rare opportunities for maintenance. As part of the Structural Health and Prognostics Management (SHPM) project at Sandia National Laboratories, smart loads management (controls) are investigated for their potential to increase the fatigue life of offshore wind turbine roto...

Written by a group of international experts in their field, this Theme Issue provides an overview of the recent advances made by the fluid mechanics community dedicated to offshore engineering, with a specific focus into modelling issues. Although of great importance we have purposely neglected all applications related to ‘emerging offshore engineering’ concerned with renewable energy extractio...