Oregon wind farm sees blades, bolts fly off as failures mount
A new report has revealed the unreliability of a major Oregon wind farm, discovered after a blade from a windmill detached and flew across the field.
According to The Oregonian, in January, a delivery driver found some broken, industrial-size bolts on the ground near one of Portland General Electric’s towering wind turbines but did not know who to tell and used it as a paperweight.
Image: The Post Millennial
Among the findings were:
- PGE has failed to report public safety incidents at Biglow Canyon, in potential violation of its operating agreement with the state including where hatches, metal disks and blade bolts have fallen off turbines from a height of about 265 feet and regulators state that even small objects can reach almost 90 mph when falling.
- According to maintenance records, PGE knowingly operated at least four turbines at Biglow Canyon with broken blade bolts, in one case for nearly a year.
- The wind turbines and transformers at Biglow Canyon have been plagued by leaks of oil and lubricants creating environmental and fire hazards. According to the outlet, transformers have ruptured regularly, causing two fires and spilling about 3,000 gallons of mineral oil into surrounding soil.
- Since 2010, PGE has reported more than a dozen oil spills and other incidents at Biglow Canyon with the potential to affect public safety, which is approximately three times more than any other wind farm regulated by the state.
- Biglow Canyon has also generated much less energy than PGE originally projected and less power than neighboring wind farms of comparable age.
- Ratepayers may end up footing the bill for assets that are no longer useful due to the project’s 76 turbines manufactured by Vestas are halfway through their projected life but PGE is already considering replacing them and if that happens by the end of 2023, ratepayers would be on the hook for $156 million in remaining costs.
“there is no effective national, state or county reporting requirement or database tracking safety or operational incidents at wind farms, and only 13 of the largest of Oregon’s 48 wind farms are regulated by the state, numbers that include multiple phases of some projects.”
Additionally, PGE launched an investigation into the blade throw but has asked the Oregon Department of Energy to keep those confidential until the end of the year because of the possibility of litigation.
PGE has said that state regulators have not issued any violations for failing to report safety incidents. According to the company only two of the incidents it did report were actually related to public health and safety, leaking oil posed only a low environmental or fire risk, and lost service time is likely the result of grid constraints beyond its control.
To eliminate all its ‘greenhouse emissions’, PGE would need to massively increase its renewable energy resources and manage them effectively for decades. However, wind power is heavily dependent on federal subsidies, and according to experts consulted by The Oregonian, “those subsidies are structured in a way that incentivizes operators to skimp on maintenance for older equipment that is no longer eligible.”
Biglow Canyon landowners recently hired a Portland lawyer to investigate potential remedies to a perceived lack of transparency from PGE, and feeling financially shortchanged by excessive turbine downtime, as payments to them are based on energy production.
According to The Oregonian, pieces of turbine equipment are falling into landowners’ fields regularly and PGE has not reported those incidents to the state promptly, or in some cases at all.
The outlet also reported that PGE kept its four Siemens turbines with broken blade bolts running for months while awaiting spare parts.
According to a study published in the academic journal Engineering Failure Analysis, the failure of blade bolts due to stress and metal fatigue is cited as a frequent cause of turbine failure.
However, the outlet noted that nearby facilities are performing better.
PGE’s alternative to spending more on maintenance would be to replace most of the components of the Vestas turbines, which would, increase their efficiency and output and is not uncommon. But ratepayers could end up swallowing the remaining value tied to the existing machinery.
Bold emphasis added
Header image: Oregon Live
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Jerry Krause
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Hi PSI Readers,
One find it amazing that Galileo wrote about the principle involved in two recent PSI articles.
(https://principia-scientific.com/oregon-wind-farm-sees-blades-bolts-fly-off-as-failures-mount/) and (https://principia-scientific.com/newly-found-portugese-dinosaur-may-be-largest-ever-found-in-europe/)
This principle is large bodies easily break because of their heavy weight. By copying and pasting excerpts from Day Two of this book, I will tempt a reader to read more of DIALOGUES CONCERNING TWO NEW SCIENCE as translated Henry Crew and Alfonso de Salvio (1914)
Galileo began: “From what has already been demonstrated, you can plainly see the impossibility of increasing the size of structures to vast dimensions either in art or in nature; likewise the impossibility of building ships, palaces, or temples of enormous size in such a way that their oars, yards, beams, iron-bolts, and, in short, all their other parts will hold together; nor can nature produce trees of extraordinary size because the branches would break down under their own weight; so also it would be impossible to build up the bony structures of men, horses, or other animals so as to hold together and perform their normal functions if these animals were to be increased enormously in height; for this increase in height can be accomplished only by employing a material which is harder and stronger than usual, or by enlarging the size of the bones, thus changing their shape until the form and appearance of the animals suggest a monstrosity.”
“Whereas, if the size of a body be diminished, the strength of that body is not diminished in the same proportion; indeed the smaller the body the greater its relative strength. Thus a small dog could probably carry on his back two or three dogs of his own size; but I believe that a horse could not carry even one of his own size.“
“Simp, The trend of your argument, Salviati, is evident. Since fish live in water which on account of its density [corpulenza] or, as others would say, heaviness [gravità] diminishes the weight [peso] of bodies immersed in it, you mean to say that, for this reason, the bodies of fish will be devoid of weight and will be supported without injury to their bones. But this is not all; for although the remainder of the body of the fish may be without weight, there can be no question but that their bones have weight. Take the case of a whale’s rib, having the dimensions of a beam; who can deny its great weight or its tendency to go to the bottom when placed in water? One would, therefore, hardly expect these great masses to sustain themselves.”
“Salv. A very shrewd objection! And now, in reply, tell me whether you have ever seen fish stand motionless at will under water, neither descending to the bottom nor rising to the top, without the exertion of force by swimming?”
“Simp. This is a well-known phenomenon.’
Have a good day, Jerry
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