Engineering news
Siemens has delivered its first gearless direct drive wind turbines to a wind farm in Scotland.
The SWT3.0-101 direct drive technology wind turbine requires half the parts of a conventional turbine, including a smaller number of moving parts. This allows, Siemens said, for increased output and improved maintainability, while requiring less maintenance and entailing increased profitability for customers.
Six 125m direct drive wind turbines will be delivered to the Millour Hill Community Wind Farm, Scotland, for Cheshire-based wind farm developer Community Windpower. The company works with local communities to build wind farms to provide economic, educational and environmental benefits for local schools and whole communities, it said.
The Millour Hill Community Windfarm will consist of the six SWT3.0-101 wind turbines, which could generate up to 18MW of clean electricity in the local area, principally Beith, Dalry and Kilbirnie. The wind farm is thought to be capable of saving approximately 20,340 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions each year.
Turbine installation at the wind farm is planned for December, with commissioning complete in early 2012. The turbines will then be supported by a 15-year service agreement with Siemens.
Christoph Ehlers, managing director of Siemens Renewables in the UK, said: “This is a very significant and exciting project for Siemens and represents the entry into the UK of the Siemens direct drive technology.”
Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets has provided debt facilities for the project for the term of the construction period plus 15 years. Oliver Alexander, director of renewable energy at Lloyds said: “This is the first project that will form part of a portfolio that will build up to in excess of 200MW over the next three years. We look forward to supporting Community Windpower as the portfolio grows, while working with Siemens on financing more of their direct drive wind turbines.”
The turbines, which have a power rating of 3MW, feature a gearless drive train design with a compact, synchronous generator, excited by permanent magnets. Siemens said that the main advantage of permanent magnet generators was that their simple and robust design requires no excitation power, slip rings or excitation control systems. This leads to high efficiency even at low loads, Siemens said.
HenrikStiesdal, chief technical officer of the Siemens Wind Power Business Unit, said: “Our SWT-3.0-101 will offer 25% more power than our present 2-3MW machine, but with a lower weight and only half the parts. Our main target for the machine was to reduce complexity in order to increase reliability and profitability. We are confident that our direct drive wind turbine is a reliable investment in the future of power generation.”