High tariff on electricity keeps ageing turbines going

Our CEO Benny Thomsen was interviewed by the Danish national news magazine INGENIØREN for an article about reasons for retrofitting to extend the lifespan of ageing turbines that have reached 20 years of life. In this story, we bring you some of the highlights from the article published October 26th in the magazine.

Within in the last year, dismantling of ageing turbines has been greatly decreased. For the time being, there is 4.224 wind turbines onshore in Denmark. Approximately half of these turbines have reached its designed lifetime of 20 years of age. But despite this, these turbines are still running strong with renovated gearboxes, repaired wings and completely new control systems.

In the article, INGENIØREN have talked to turbine owners, asset managers and service companies. A resent business case that is highlighted is Arrild wind farm in Denmark which Spica Technology has helped retrofit with new control systems in 12 Wind World turbines. Asset Manager Daniel Leuchtman describes the upgrade with a new control system as very positive due to less expensive service visits and the enhanced possibility with remote access to troubleshoot and restart the wind turbines.

Less turbines are dismantled and last longer

Last year, 165 ageing wind turbines were dismantled. But this year, only 6 turbines has been dismantled. It is believed that the tariff on electricity is causing this as it has been higher in 2018 than resent years.

Senior Economist Søren Klinge from The Danish Wind Turbine Owners’ Association claims to INGENIØREN that it is the tariff on electricity and the possibility to replace the ageing turbine with a larger wind turbine that decides for how long ageing turbines are kept due to optimisation of the portfolio.

By upgrading an ageing turbine, the turbine’s lifespan is often extended 5-10 more years if the tariff maintains high and above 0,3 DKK pr. kWh.

CEO Carl Ingemann Slyk from WindTech also supports the claim on the tariff on electricity to be a contributing factor for lifetime extension of turbines. In the article, he tells that their customers are faster to decide and are more able to obtain funding for preventive inspections and lifetime extension with the current high tariff on electricity.

>> Read the full article in INGENIØREN here (please note, however, full access requires a subscription).

Source: INGENIØREN no. 43, 2018.