Extreme engineering is becoming the norm as offshore wind farms continue to scale up. Sweeping an area of a standard NFL field at 12.3 per revolution with massive 140-meter (459-foot) blades, the MySE 18.X-28X will be the largest wind turbine ever built.
Just a week ago we wrote about CSSC’s new H260-18MW, the world’s largest wind turbine. Partly built in a special and very spacious seaside facility, this offshore wind farm has taken over his MySE 16.0-242 from MingYang as the largest wind turbine on earth.
Now, MingYang has hit back at this game of one-upmanship and announced something pretty big. And CSSC’s 18-megawatt rated effort wasn’t small. Each of its three blades stretches an unimaginable 128 m (420 ft). But the new MySE 18.X-28X promises to “cross the 18 MW threshold” with a staggering swept area of 66,052 square meters (711,000 square feet).
MingYang says it can handle “the most extreme ocean conditions,” including level 17 typhoons with wind speeds exceeding 56.1 m/s (202 km/h / 125.5 mph). With an average wind speed of 8.5 m/s (30.6 km/h / 19 mph), MingYang predicts that it will generate 80 GWh of energy annually, “enough to supply 96,000 inhabitants.”
Why bother making these things so huge? Increasing the swept area of the fan increases the overall yield by providing more slices of the sky to collect energy. But perhaps more importantly, wind farms need to be considered as holistic systems. One of the biggest costs for offshore installations is the work required to uproot these giant turbines on the ocean floor and force something against the wind.
So both MingYang and CSSC are marketing these giant mega turbines primarily as a cost-cutting measure. This helps lower the capital cost of setting up wind farms and ultimately the cost of the energy they produce.
“Compared to the installation of the 13MW model,” reads MingYang’s statement on LinkedIn. MW.”
Using our advanced math skills, we estimated that this could save $120-$150 million in CAPEX on a gigawatt scale project. For reference, the 1.2 GW Hornsea One project, built using 7 MW turbines, is estimated to have cost “at least £4.2 billion” (US$5.153 billion). In a project this large, it could amount to a few percent.
Before manufacturers find a practical upper limit on the size of offshore wind turbines, one has to wonder just how big these things can get. Could it be the point where the tips of the blades become supersonic? How big do they need to be, or are they limited by the logistics of towing these giants into deep water bit by bit, hoisting up their giant blades and bolting them to hubs? Will they last as long as smaller turbines, given the failure of one unit? will it be?
Either way, as fans of extreme engineering, we must marvel at these towering green energy giants. Reaching nearly 1,000 feet above the water, they are truly a sight to behold. Someone should set up a GoFundMe for Don Quixote. A man would need a dolphin and a spear humdinger.
Source: MingYang via Recharge
