Oceans are an incredible source of energy and till now has been under-utilised due to the high-cost involved, technical and environmental challenges. Floating offshore wind power may have a significant role in upcoming years providing energy to power our households and industrial facilities.
What are the challenges
These giant full-scaled floating wind turbines are massive conical steel structures, which can measure up to 254 m (846 feet). Investment along with collaboration between the different sectors that are involved in the different steps of the construction are needed, these not only helps to down costs but also to improve efficiency.
This emerging technology in the wind industry has been successfully tested in a full-scaled floating farm located 15 miles (25 km) off the coast of Peterhead in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
The Hywind Scotland Pilot Park, which has five 6MV turbines with a total installed capacity of 30 MW, and a transmission voltage of 33 kV., has been developed and operated by Hywind Limited owned by Statoil whose principal activity is the development of renewable energy projects in the United Kingdom.
The future
The resource potential is believed to be in deep waters where wind speeds are typically faster than on land. Just small increases in speed result in large increases of energy production. In so far, as this new technology evolves, much larger areas of the ocean could be used to install floating wind farms and not just along the coast.
More developers recognise the optimistic future for the wind industry and are involved in floating wind demos around the world. The technology has been tested for a couple of years now and the costs have started to come down so it is expected soon more locations will be added including the northern part of UK, US, and Japan.
Driven by this scenario, wind tower manufacturers can trust Faccin’s experience and successful track record of installed wind tower automation systems for their most exigent wind tower projects.
Customized cost-effective solutions
Bending hundreds of cans every month can only be accomplished with a rolling package like the innovative ‘Faccin’s Wind Tower Automation System’ designed to provide manufacturers with the reliability, precision and automation required in this type of manufacturing processes. The system is able to reach the floor to floor production time of 20min per rolled tube. It combines a powerful super-sized plate-rolling machine with key components like a strong side support, a sturdy top support and a feeding table with alignment device, all accessories controlled by a highly advanced fully programmable CNC designed to automate the most complex rolling projects.
Reliability, speed and accuracy must go hand to hand with costs reduction, and the job should be accomplished by a single operator through the use of a user-friendly CNC capable of controlling automatically not only the machine but also the handling system.
The Company
“Faccin is proud to have already supplied machines to the main players in Europe, USA and ASIA and to contribute to the green energy production. The company strongly believes in the future of the wind towers business onshore -particularly the offshore wind farms where the use of plate bending rolls is essential.”
Should you be interested in this technology, do not hesitate to contact us and book a demonstration