Floating wind turbine main component replacement

The future commercial floating wind farms will be far from the coast, and it seems necessary to develop reliable solutions for heavy maintenance operations at sea, such as replacing a major component of the rotor-nacelle assembly. Indeed, for economic and technical reasons, it is not optimal to bring the wind turbines back to the port.

One of the difficulties with heavy maintenance operations at sea is the depth of water at the sites targeted, which exceeds the capacity of the self-elevating platforms currently in use. It is therefore necessary to develop solutions adapted to floating supports and to meet the challenges of heavy lifting at height with increasing size of turbines.

Developing a methodology to assess the operability of major component replacement (MCR) floating-to-floating solutions is the objective of the recently completed research project called FLOWTOM.

A webinar which focused on the methodology validated through basin test and numerical simulations for MCR was held on 12 November.

Watch the full replay of FLOWTOM webinar

PROGRAMME

• Introduction
  • Webinar programme, context and content of the whole FLOWTOM project – Laure COSSALTER, France Energies Marines > Video | Slides
• Basin tests for numerical model validation
  • Specification of wave tank tests – Benoît AUGIER, Ifremer > Video | Slides
  • Validation of numerical model – Tanguy COQUIO, France Energies Marines > Video | Slides
• Case study: operability definition of MCR steps
  • Methodology development and case study specifications – Tanguy COQUIO, France Energies Marines > Video | Slides
  • Case of transfer of heavy package from a vessel to floating offshore wind turbine – Melissa MAK, EDF > Video | Slides
  • Case of hub replacement at tower top of a floating offshore wind turbine – Pierre-Alain FREMONT, SBM Offshore > Video | Slides
• Conclusion > Video | Slides
• Q&R Session > Video

Download FLOWTOM webinar programme (PDF)

Photo credit: France Energies Marines