Story by Eric Worrall –
![wind_turbine_bearings[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/wind_turbine_bearings1.jpg?quality=83)
A few years ago, I used to know a senior wind turbine engineer. One evening, over a few beers, he told me the dirty secret of his profession:
“The problem is the bearings. If we make the bearings bigger, the bearings last longer, but making the bearings larger increases friction, which kills turbine efficiency. But we can’t keep using the current bearings – replacing them is sending us broke. What we need is a quantum leap in bearing technology – bearing materials which are at least ten times tougher than current materials.”
At the time there was very little corroborating online material available to support this intriguing comment – but evidence seems to be accumulating that bearings are a serious problem for the wind industry.
Siemens citing bearing failures as part of the reason for a substantial fall in profit;
http://www.offshorewind.biz/2014/05/07/siemens-energy-division-profit-down-54-pct/
In the announcement of the opening of a new Siemens research facility;
http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2013/03/19/siemens-wind-turbine-research/
“… The Brande test center would evaluate the main parts of their wind turbines such as main bearings …”
http://www.geartechnology.com/newsletter/0112/drives.htm (an attempt to make direct drive turbines, to reduce bearing wear)
“… More accurately, it is typically the bearings within the gearbox that fail, in turn gumming up the gearbox, but that’s a story for another time. …”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burbo_Bank_Offshore_Wind_Farm
“… During summer 2010 Siemens decided to change the blade bearings on all 25 turbines as a pre-emptive measure after corrosion was found in blade bearings found on other sites. …”
Of course, there is the occasional video of catastrophic turbine failure;
Suggestions the industry is trying to conceal the scale of the turbine fire problem;
All of which creates an interesting question – just how much of our money is the government prepared to waste, to keep their wind dream afloat? If the costs are far greater than the industry admits, how long is the wind industry going to carry that additional hidden cost, before they try to push the costs onto taxpayers, or abandon wind technology altogether?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2116877/Is-future-Britains-wind-rush.html
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Maintenance and repair costs are always an integral part of sound investment analysis. A much shorter than anticipated lifetime of rotor blades, gearbox and generator would definitely have a negative impact on net present value.
We have a mob in Australia-Beyond Zero Emissions that reckons it is viable to build a high speed rail link Brisbane-Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne powered by wind and solar. Looks like their power supply will be a bit more expensive than they thought. As it is, their figures were idiotically optimistic. I did my own calculations- no way it could be built for 84 billion, especially as a conventional rail system in Sydney completed recently that goes about 1/5 the way across the whole city cost 8.4 billion. The high speed rail cost per km is considerably higher ( turning circle, security to prevent anything entering the track precinct-bit messy being hit at 300mph) so they are deluded. If they are off by as little as 20%, the thing can NEVER pay itself off-just get deeper and deeper in to debt.Honestly, since when did any major infrastructure project actually run on budget? Then again, estimates of efficiency and total power output of wind power are grossly overestimated.
If they’re anything like the environmentalists here in the states they are probably planning on mounting wind turbines on each car of the train to power it.
But just think…the faster the train goes, the more power will be generated!!
Lol.
Cost for high speed (“commercial speed” 320 km/h) railroads in France: 15 millions € per km (rail only, no station building). It can get higher when many bridges are needed. Most high speed railroads will never cover their cost.
Normal railroad “just” only 1 million per km.
In an honest free market industry, one would hope that ball bearing failure would have been forseen by those engineering the systems. But, since this is essentially a fake industry propped up by government and ultimately taxpayers and ratepayers, not so much.
Post ruined by the last paragraph and linking to The Daily Mail *twice*. Linking to the Daily Mail is a credibility killer, and for good reason.
Even if you are not an AGW believer, I don’t understand why you would be against developing renewables. All energy production technology has technological limitations to be overcome. Internal combustion engines have been constantly improved since their inception simply to overcome known limitations of their design. Gearboxes, carburators and different engine geometries and mechanisms (2-stroke, 4-stroke etc) were early examples of leaps in technology to overcome existing issues.
Similarly, wind turbines have issues that need to be addressed to unleash the potential that lies in the technology. The major one, as is the case with a lot of technological development right now, is in energy storage. As a non-constant producer of energy, ways of storing excess energy production will be required over time. This is coming. This post highlights another issue, the bearings, that perhaps has not received enough (public) attention until now. That is a good thing. Dismissing the entire technology on the basis of one technological limitation – one that isn’t even of fatal importance, even – is not a good thing.
In the end, limiting ourselves to single venues of energy production is just a way to set us up for failure – particularly if that single venue is based on finite resources. This does not mean we should not use those finite resources; it simply means we should use more than that.
I mean, the current uptick in renewable energy production is just market forces at work. The public wants renewables, and the market is in a place where it obviously pays. And before you object by means of invoking subsidies, I will rebut that with the fact that pretty much all energy production is subsidised – and the fossil fuel industry is *massively* subsidised. Subsidies, government or not, are entirely valid market-based mechanisms for steering developments in desirable directions – and they do work.
No, the “public” doesn’t want high cost renewables. They want low cost power. There is well heeled “portion” of the public that want to assuage their guilt for existing by buying “green” with no clue as to what “green” is and how many companies claim to be “green” that are not “green” at all. No links. Look it up. I like my diesel in my tractor and I like riding my horses not walking behind them with a plough.
The roads, the sewers, the water system, the gas, the electricity that you use in your home are ALL subsidized in one way or another. I have worked on them all and part of the calculations of the economics ALWAYS involved looking at what money came from where. Subsidies of one sort or another float through the whole of the North American Economy..
“are ALL subsidized in one way or another”
how?
by who?
Fact, number, sources, please.
Wayne, well said.
“As a non-constant producer of energy, ways of storing excess energy production will be required over time. This is coming.”
Sure it is. It has been coming for the last 100 years, and probably will be coming for the next century as well. There is no practical technology for large-scale energy storage except pumped hydropower that even exists as a concept.
Stop with the propaganda. The fossil fuel industry is not subsidized. The amount the industry pays in taxes far exceeds any tax breaks they get. They get zero in checks from the Feds, yet pay massively to the Feds and States.
When people say the oil industry is subsidized they think it’s a big tax break, which it is not.
Here are the main examples in the US:
– topping up the oil reserve
– energy subsidies for low income households
– manufacturer tax breaks on the cost of doing business (available to all manufacturers).
These add up to approx $4B. The taxes they pay are many times more.
So when some greenie ecotard says the oil industry is heavily subsidized, they are full of it.
What they call subsidies in the US are in fact:
– topping up the oil reserve (national security)
– energy subsidies to low in come households (Federal Assistance)
– manufacturers tax break (available to all manufacturers)
These total approx $4B which is far less than the taxes they pay.
When supporters of renewables go on about oil subsidies they are trying to defect from the fact that renewables wouldn’t exist with tax dollars, period.
You state that renewable success is being driven by market forces, but fossil fuels are massively subsidized.
That is delusional on a spectacular scale. Shouting entirely absurd lies does not make you credible.
“I don’t understand why you would be against developing renewables. ”
Straw man argument. Is anyone here actually against developing renewables? I didn’t think so.
BJ Hanssen (@BJHanssen) @August 26, 2014 at 3:54 am
You mean, like the Elwha River hydroelectric dams?
The rest of your post losses credibility when you state that the fossil fuel industry is subsidized. Its a lie and you know it. Where does the subsidies come from in Saudi Arabia ? The sale of sand ? All the petroleum and gas producing countries and regions are prosperous beyond their wildest dreams.
Disinformation. EROEI Energy Return On Energy Invested. The science there is also against you. http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/
The money quote; “Several recent analyses of the inputs to our energy systems indicate that, against expectations, energy storage cannot solve the problem of intermittency of wind or solar power. Not for reasons of technical performance, cost, or storage capacity, but for something more intractable: there is not enough surplus energy left over after construction of the generators and the storage system to power our present civilization.”.
A few days ago in Weymouth (UK) I heard that one boat in the harbour had a full time job taking diesel out to the local wind farm to keep the blades spinning to stop the gear boxes from seizing.
This wind farm in Hawaii only produces power 45% of the time. The other 55% of the time, power is produced by diesel generators that back up the wind farm’s turbines. Yeah, so much for “green power”:
–The Waimea Generating Station is located only a few hundred yards from my house. It is owned and operated by Hawaii Electric Light Company, Inc. (HELCO). The plant consists of three 2.5 MW diesel engine generators that are fired on Number 2 fuel oil with a maximum sulfur content of 0.5 percent by weight. Every time I notice that its calm on my morning run, I can always find the smoke rising from these generators. They come on when the wind turbines aren’t spinning–.
http://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Wind-Power/When-the-Wind-Doesnt-Blow.html
BJ Hanssen (@BJHanssen)
August 26, 2014 at 3:54 am
Polywell Fusion.
Re: turbine failure – reduce the warranty period. Then blame rising costs on poor maintenance.
BJ Hanssen stated
“I mean, the current uptick in renewable energy production is just market forces at work. ”
The huge subsidies being pumped into renewables is not “market forces”. Most people are here are not against renewables but their inefficiencies and their massive subsidies! Without long term sudsidies they was remain a minor blip in world energy production.
Every time I drive by one of those giant spinning propellers, I wonder what would happen if one of them broke and a giant, cartwheeling piece of it headed toward the road. Those things are obviously dangerous. That they are also a more expensive source of power just underlines how stupid their use is.
You cannot buy a household electric fan without a safety cage, but these giant propellers are supposedly fit to operate anywhere without anything similar to protect the public…
They’re kinda pretty when they catch fire:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=wind+turbine+burning&id=770B2EE7813C0323132C8F177ACD814C00330C21&FORM=IQFRBA
I can see it now. A new reality show “Wind Farm Scrapers”.
BJ Hanssen
No, Linking to ‘The Guardian’ is a credibility killer. In this small crowded country (Britain) wind factories really jar as they are often placed on our finest uplands. You don’t save the environment by trashing the countryside.
I believe in energy horses for courses and in the UK’s position both wind and solar are bad ideas for a variety of reasons, aesthetic, technological and monetary.. However, nowhere here is further than 70 miles from the sea so the development of ocean based energy sources seem the obvious way forward for us.
tonyb
@ur momisugly D. Cohen August 26, 2014 at 4:13 am
The guard around your household electric fan is to stop it amputating your fingers, not contain a flying fragment of fanblade should it fragment.
A cage would not hold any part of one of those 7 ton blades anyhow. But they build them closer to homes than blade throw distances, or even the manufacturers safety setbacks. So irresponsible!
Not only that, some wind turbines are close to chemical units:
my translation:
Source: http://www.7sur7.be/7s7/fr/2765/Environnement/article/detail/1635455/2013/05/18/Les-eoliennes-plus-dangereuses-que-les-centrales-nucleaires.dhtml
BJ
Your response is a political statement about a decades old industry, that has very real engineering problems on many fronts that it has not been able to resolve. Your understanding of the economic and public demand for this technology is also suspect. Sorry to be rude but your post is nothing more than elegantly worded Cool-aide.
“I don’t understand why you would be against developing renewables”
Who is against developing renewables? I doubt you will find anyone, or at least a significant number, of people here who are against developing anything. The issue most people here seem to have is with deploying a technology that is not developed to the point of viability
” one that isn’t even of fatal importance”
So lying about the costs of operating wind turbines isn’t of fatal importance? How can you compare different energy sources without real truthful information about the total costs?
If the bearing issue is severe enough it turns an investment in wind turbines from a profitable venture into a black hole of debt.
I agree that all technologies have issues and are improved over time. But if wind turbines have not reached a point where they can succesfully provide power at a reasonable cost then the solution is not to keep building and promoting them as a currently viable technology. the solution is to continue with research into improving the technology to the point of viability and not pouring vast quantities of money (much of it public money) into a currently non-viable venture.
“I mean, the current uptick in renewable energy production is just market forces at work.”
When the government provides FITs and rebates and tax advantages it is not ‘market forces at work’. It is politics forcing a technology onto the public for political reasons.
Hi,
The vague term “bearing failure due to corrosion” from one of the reports quoted is disingenuous!
A major cause of bearing failure is a result of “Brinelling” (the flattening of the ball or the indentation of the bearing track, due to pressure of weight of turbine shaft and armature). Do a Google search on brinelling.
The flat spot on the ball will cause the ball to skid and not to rotate, thus creating heat and premature failure.
The need to avoid brinelling can be seen in all large roting machinery, in that a “cogging” motor is fitted to keep the shaft constantly slowly turning when the device is unoperational.
This is the reason that you will see wind turbine blades slowly rotating even on a windless day. They are taking power from the grid to drive their cogging motors.
Failure of the grid supply to a wind turbine, or a fault condition that results in the blades being locked, will soon cause problems.
Changing bearings high in the air on top of a wind turbine tower is not a job for the faint hearted!
One of the worst environments for turbines is the use of gas turbines in naval vessels. The large naval marine turbines have to be cogged constantly in harbour, as any chop or pounding will increase the bearing degredation.
My father in law, was a charted mechanical engineer, who worked the design on aircraft engines all his life. He would never purchase a newv car that had been delivered on a transporter. He used to claim that the bumping and shock on the axles of the stationary cars on the transporter during its journey would cause brinelling of the car’s wheel bearings, shortening the bearing life. He always tried to buy cars delivered under their own power, by a delivery driver, not by transporter.
Then depends on what you think of as a subsidy.
Here in the UK, VAT on domestic energy bills (gas and electric) is set at 5% instead of 20%. The billions not raised as revenue is considered to be a subsidy to the fossil fuel industry.
Oil and gas companies pay 50% Petroleum Revenue Tax (PRT) and 32% Supplementary Charge (SC). Additionally, they have the Ring Fence Corporation Tax (RFCT) which prevents them from offsetting profits in one part with losses in another. When an oil field runs low the SC is reduced This is also considered to be a subsidy.
Much is being made of the UK governments decision to give fracking tax breaks. What they are actually doing is reducing the SC and relaxing the RFCT so costs can be offset against profits. As usual, this is also considered a subsidy despite the fact that any fracking company will still be paying tax at more than twice the rate of any wind farm.
The so called fossil fuel subsidies don’t exist.
Yes, and OECD is guilty of these manipulations! They have this list of fossil subsidies for many countries, and as usual with any “information” I read, I compared the “information” with things I already know about, that is the subsidies and taxes here in France. And OECD lists diesel fuel as being subsided in France, just because it is taxed (heavily), but less than classical (non-diesel, I don’t know the correct word) car fuel. I don’t care about what they writes about other countries, given that they couldn’t get a very simple fact right about France, a country where the tax rules are documented and easily available.
So I know this OECD fossil subsidies list is a load of crap. Now I will question anything green- or “sustainable-” related OECD publishes.
As usual, the question is ‘When will there be a loud, repeating voice in the main stream media that will counter all the watermelon bafflegab?’.
This provides the evidence that wind advocates have lost their bearings 🙂
Yours truly is a design engineer and regognises this bearing issue as just another bit of engineering reality that loads up the capex and the repair and maintenance costs of this hair brained technology and its submerged cousin, wave power.
The basic problem is, once you steel yourself and put aside the intermittent and fluctuating nature of the FREE ENERGY!! supply, including all that FREE ENERGY !! that rips past in a storm, the devices have to be engineered for the expectation that extreme weather events will occur that will obliterate the device unless it is engineered to resist 5 to 10 times its normal FREE ENERGY !! harvesting capacity.
What other devices have to have such load factors? Not many and nothing at the core of primary community infrastructure.
FREE ENERGY!! is an advertising slogan that belongs down some supermarket aisle, the one with the chocolates, potato crisps and other junk food.
actually I ‘recognises’ it
Bearings are a B—-! But motion does require them.
I wonder if Siemens realise that their name is an anagram of nemesis?
Bearings have been around a long time, here is one by Leonardo da Vinci.
Anybody seen an FMEA for these freaking things? And of course selling this junk to just one bunch of dumb customers solves all maintenance costs. And we are so lucky with the deal(s) the first five service years is free of maintenance charges I believe?
I had the brinelling failure on a car gearbox input shaft bearing after 21k miles…Mazda. Had to write to Hiroshima to get the manufacturer to kick the UK local agents ar*e. Very awkward b*stards so gaining BMW another sale.
I’ll try again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:%D0%A8%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BF%D0%BE%D0%B4%D1%88%D0%B8%D0%BF%D0%BD%D0%B8%D0%BA%D0%B8.jpg
BJ
the holy grail of energy storage for wind energy will never make economic sense because it reduces the EROEI (Energy Returned on Energy Invested) of wind energy below the break even point. John Morgan explains why in this recent article titled The Catch-22 of Energy Storage http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/