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Wind Turbine Maintenance
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Wind Turbine Maintenance.
Things break. That is part of the nature of the universe. It is expressed according to the second law of thermodynamics in terms of a propensity for entropy in a given system. That means that everything in the universe will break eventually. We see examples of it everywhere. Old cars break down, old buildings collapse, old institutions fold up and walk off into the night. Even old people eventually die. As depressing as it sounds, everything breaks. So if you plan to own anything, you should plan to maintain it. Maintenance is the act of keeping a thing in good repair. It involves replacing parts that wear out, removing dust, grime, and other things that accumulate in or around it, and generally keeping it in like-new condition as far as possible.
What does this have to do with windmills? Well as a system that is ideally in constant motion, a wind turbine has several parts that will inevitably wear out and need replacing. So wind turbine maintenance is a very real and necessary concern for anyone planning to utilize wind power. Wind power has many advantages over other forms of power. It has less environmental impact than hydroelectric power. It is more efficient in converting energy to electricity than solar power. But one shortcoming it has, especially in comparison to those two sources of power is that wind turbines are prone to breaking.
Think about it, when was the last time you heard of a solar panel breaking? They have no moving parts! Sure, the connections can wear out after years in the sun, and eventually you want to replace outdated panels with more efficient versions, but it's not something you hear about on a regular basis. Again, ask yourself when the last time you heard of a dam failing was? This year a major dam in Russia failed, and it was major news, why is that? Because it's not something that happens often, that's why. When you put up a dam, even more than when you install solar panels, you're planning for a significant return window on your investment.
The thing is with proper wind turbine maintenance you can see similar returns on an investment in wind power as well. There are a few parts of a wind turbine that are prone to failure. One is the blades themselves. The blades are subject to constant exposure to wind stress. This can cause a blade to weaken and fail over time. While they can be replaced, innovations in blade design are making this need less frequent. The bearings on a wind turbine however are given a definite life span and if you buy a windmill you should plan for them to be replaced. The lifetime of the bearings depends a lot on the air conditions a windmill is subjected to, the bearings are usually given a span in revolutions, rather than months or years.Another way you can reduce the wind turbine maintenance costs you incur is to have a proper high wind shutoff point. You may think that the higher the wind speeds, the better your intake of power would be, and up to a certain point that statement is true. But in extremely high wind, the stresses put on the mill by gusts of wind are too great to handle. If the mill is stationary, the stress a gust puts on the mill is actually less than the impact of that same gust on a mill in motion. It's akin to crashing one car into another at 20 mph. If the other car is parked, the damages will be much less than if that other car were going 60 mph. Most turbines on the market today have high wind shutoff thresholds to save on the wind turbine maintenance for just such a reason.
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