In early wind turbine installations, lightning was not considered a threat, or the nature of the threat was not well understood; however over recent years there have been a large number of lightning strikes reported to wind turbines and in many of these there have been instances of severe damage.
In particular the blades are subject to catastrophic damage, and because of both material and installation costs, any damage to the blades is expensive. A significant other area of damage or disruptions is where lightning affects electrical systems and control circuitry. Statistics show that lightning damage is a major contributor to down-time in the operation of wind farms and the most common insurance claim filed by wind farm owners.
Lightning protection design system is the best solution
Purpose of applying this solution is to attract lightning on arresters and not to let lightning hit any other spot on wind turbine.
The function of an external lightning protection design system is to intercept direct lightning strikes to the tower of a wind turbine and to discharge the lightning current from the point of strike to the ground without causing thermal or mechanical damage or dangerous sparking which may lead to fire or explosion and endanger people.
Our offer to you
To minimise risk of downtime caused by lightning strike, LEC manufactures and certifies lightning protection design systems in accordance to relevant international standards.
Our protection measures for a custom lightning protection solution include:
- Estimation of risk posed to a wind turbine by lightning
- High voltage and high current testing of wind turbine blades
- High current testing of bearings
- Determination and examination of probable current path
- Personnel protection
- Wind farm earthing
- Collation of recorded strike data (if any)
With the growing use of wind turbines for power generation, the role of LPS to limit outages and system downtime will become increasingly critical. In addition to designing wind turbines that can handle minimal damage from lightning strikes, it is also important to consider lightning protection design that minimize the time, complexity, and cost of repairs. Reduced probability of damage, combined with cheaper and faster repair mechanisms, is likely to significantly reduce the economic impact of unavoidable lightning strikes.
Want to learn more about lightning protection design systems for wind turbines? Contact us.