For over 11 years, Renewable Advice Ltd has supported businesses who manufacture, own and operate wind turbines. This working relationship began by providing consultancy to reduce wind turbine blade companies’ production cycle time and capital costs – essentially, optimizing budgets through a clear business strategy and controlled methods of production. Over time, this support has become more and more focused on operational inspection and repair of wind turbine blades. The aim: get them up and running as quickly as possible.
Benn Faulkner, managing director, started his working life as a project engineer for a wind turbine blade manufacturer, therefore has a wealth of experience in the field. He understand better than anyone the efforts involved in detecting an issue and fixing it accordingly:
“This may sound incredibly obvious, but the only way to avoid severe disruption to wind turbines is through close, regular inspection. We currently use drones to source photographic evidence of any detectable faults, followed-up, where required by a physical hands-on inspection. It is therefore our job to correctly identify every defect, for instance a crack in the structure, and propose a budget and timeplan to deal with the problem”.
For Renewable Advice, as well as the industry as a whole, there are currently two main issues which prevent efficient maintenance of wind turbines: a significant skills gap of personnel able to carry out the work and callouts being reactive to a fault, rather than proactive.