The EWIC project will demonstrate how the value of end of warranty inspections can be enhanced – with the overall objective to reduce LCoE and extend the operational lifetime of the blades. Vattenfall, E.ON, HOFOR together with The Blade Group Network – consisting of more than 30 wind turbine owners – have strongly encouraged that new concepts for the inspection of turbine blades at the end of warranty need to be developed.
The wind turbine owners have teamed up with OffshoreEnergy.dk, Bladena, Total Wind Blaest, Kirt-Thomsen and Force Technology to achieve this objective. The project will define the details of how inside visual inspections should be carried out. The deployment of small size cameras and NDT in critical areas will be explored. Visual inspection and NDT techniques will be combined with knowledge about theoretical failure modes, failure modes found in the laboratory tests and with data from blades damaged in the field. This will allow the definition of an optimal strategy for the use of NDT methods such as thermography and ultrasound in selected areas. Offshoreenergy.dk has facilitated the DKK 1 million funding of the project through the European Regional Development Fund under the heading CRIF - Cost Reduction and Innovation Forum. Bladena is heading the technical part of the EWIC project as project manager.