| Wind Watch is a registered educational charity, founded in 2005. |
Wind turbine
Credit: Guthrie Center Times | April 25, 2013 | www.zwire.com ~~
Translate: FROM English | TO English
Translate: FROM English | TO English
With farmers itching to get in the fields for spring planting, there still has been no determination as to the cause of a 150′ blade falling from a newly constructed wind turbine at the Eclipse Wind Farm in southwest Guthrie and southeast Audubon counties April 4 near the Laverne Kommes farm, approximately five miles northwest of Adair.
Although the wind farm is owned by MidAmerican Energy, the turbines, which are still under warranty, were originally engineered and manufactured by Siemens Energy.
A joint statement from Siemens Energy media manager Melanie Forbrick and MidAmerican Energy media relations manager Tina Potthoff regarding the blade investigation was received by the Times Monday. A partial reprint follows:
“Siemens has developed detailed inspection and analysis protocols that are being implemented to physically assess the condition of all wind turbine blades of the same type installed at projects owned by MidAmerican Energy… Siemens engineers from the U.S. and other locations around the world are uploading and reviewing the data obtained during this inspection process to evaluate the safety of the turbine blades and determine the root cause of the blade incident. As of today – April 22, 2013 – a final root cause analysis has not been released. However, after review of the information… specific to each particular wind turbine at the Eclipse project, only those wind turbines that pass the rigorous inspection process have been or will be returned to service.”
After the statement was received, MidAmerican was queried as to whether any blades had failed the inspection.
Pottoff reported that “in an abundance of caution,” some turbine blades were identified for repair or replacement during the inspection process.
She also noted that as of Tuesday afternoon, 14 turbines were not operational, although some of those were still awaiting their initial inspections.
This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.
The copyright of this article resides with the author or publisher indicated. As part of its noncommercial educational effort to present the environmental, social, scientific, and economic issues of large-scale wind power development to a global audience seeking such information, National Wind Watch endeavors to observe “fair use” as provided for in section 107 of U.S. Copyright Law and similar “fair dealing” provisions of the copyright laws of other nations. Send requests to excerpt, general inquiries, and comments via e-mail.
| Wind Watch relies entirely on User Contributions |
 (via Stripe) |
 (via Paypal) |
Share:
[ Short URL: https://wind-watch.org/news/?p=36279 ]
