Virginia’s risk of offshore wind turbine blade failure is serious
By
David Wojick
|
July 29th, 2024
On July 26 CFACT’s President Craig Rucker sent Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin a letter warning him about the serious risk of blade failure in the giant offshore wind facility being built off Virginia. The warning builds on the recent blade failure off of Nantucket which has littered the beaches with fiberglass fragments. Virginia is also at risk.
In this article I present some technical background on that risk. The facility will be one of the world’s biggest with 176 enormous turbines. It is just getting started with pile driving so no turbine blades have been installed to date. This is an opportune time to undertake caution.
The Nantucket turbines are made by GE and they are the world’s largest in operation today at 13 MW, each driven by three huge 107 meter long blades. That is 351 feet for those of us who do not speak metric. The Virginia turbines will be even bigger at 14 MW with 108 meter (154+ feet) long. They are made by Siemens Gamesa or SG for short.
https://www.cfact.org/2024/07/29/virginias-risk-of-offshore-wind-turbine-blade-failure-is-serious/
