Applicability Analysis of Inspection and Monitoring Technologies in Wind Turbine Towers

Abstract

Wind turbines are one of the key systems in wind energy development. The wind tower supporting the whole wind turbine is a towering structure, which has been affected by installation, transportation, environment, and other factors. Furthermore, it is prone to experience other quality problems that would be difficult to detect for wind turbine towers. Therefore, the key to maintain the wind tower structure and to ensure the normal operation of a wind turbine is to carry out comprehensive and detailed detection and monitoring studies during its service stage. This paper sorted out several common quality problems including structural damage, deformation, flange bolts loosening, and corrosion of wind tower and relevant research on the detection and monitoring of these quality problems. In addition, some nondestructive testing technologies are introduced, including the ultrasonic phased array, time of flight diffraction, magnetic memory, acoustic emission, fiber Bragg grating and piezoelectric impedance, and applications in wind turbine towers.