Germany: EUROS Delivers First 7MW Offshore Blade

Three months after opening the new prototype production facility in Sassnitz/Mukran on the island of Rügen, Germany, independent rotor blade designer and manufacturer EUROS delivers its first offshore blade to the customer Mitsubishi.

This type of rotor blade with a length of 81.6 m and a mass of 32.5 tons will operate on Mitsubishi’s “Sea Angel” 7 MW offshore turbine with a rotor diameter of 167 m. The first operating sites will be located along the Scottish coast near Glasgow and in Fukushima, Japan.

The blade now will be shipped to Fraunhofer IWES in Bremerhaven, where the static and dynamic blade tests will be performed. The test loads represent the highest static and dynamic loads the blade will face in its 25 years lifetime and ensure that the structural design model and the manufacturing process comply with the calculations and verifications required for certification.

“The EUROS team is proud and satisfied with the successful delivery and shipment of the first offshore rotor blade”, said Dr. Michael Wolf, CEO of EUROS, in light of the first shipment. While the production facility in Sassnitz/Mukran was set up for the first prototype blade sets, EUROS plans to establish an offshore pre-series and series production in Rostock.

EUROS already gained experience through the production of 5MW offshore blades in 2003 and 2006.

In 2009, the company launched its own offshore blade development. Since then all aspects of rotor blade design, manufacturing, transport and maintenance were carefully investigated in an extensive research and development program in co-operation with Mitsubishi. Wind tunnel tests were carried out to ensure the highest aerodynamic performance possible. The blade’s load-carrying spar caps made of carbon fiber reinforced plastic and core materials previously only used in the aircraft industry provide the highest strength, stiffness and durability while maintaining the lowest mass possible. All production processes were tailored to the highest manufacturing quality and the dimensions of one of the world’s largest rotor blades.

With the very first blade the EUROS team has impressively shown how to marry theory and practice.

The actual mass deviation from the target design value is less than 1%. The current development is based on longtime experience. Since 1996 EUROS’ highly qualified engineers have developed poweroptimized rotor blades for onshore wind turbines with a rated power of 600kW – 3 MW. In 1999 the first production site was founded in the South of Poland and in 2008 the second was added. In June 2013 EUROS will finish the expansion progress in Poland and increase its production capacity by a fivefold. The maximum production capacity will be for rotor blades for wind turbines with up to 600 MW installed power per year.

[mappress]

Press release, May 28, 2013; Image: euros