During the last decade, Risk-Based Inspection (RBI) approaches have been applied in the oil and gas industry and represent an important tool to identify the most suitable strategy to inspect and control the deterioration in structures. These have given a theoretical background basis that potentially can also be applied for maintenance planning of Offshore Wind Turbines (OWT).
TowerPower will advance and integrate inspection techniques to produce a system that is able to monitor the whole wind turbine structure. The inspection will provide analysis of structural defects and will be capable of anticipating the time before a component can be replaced allowing for better planning and scheduling of maintenance activities cutting down O&M costs. Real-time wireless connectivity will allow the TowerPower system to be utilised to monitor OWT conditions onshore, taking into account the unpredictable nature of offshore conditions. TowerPower is a system that will be capable of:
- Monitoring the whole OWT tower structure
- Predicting the lifespan of the structural components
- Reducing operations and maintenance costs
- Monitoring from an off-site (onshore) location