Automation in the hottest offshore wind farm

Automation in offshore wind farms

Preface: with the famous alpha Ventus project - the construction of the first offshore wind farm in Germany, some energy companies announced that they had entered a new era. All on-site systems, including the lighting equipment of the helipad and the related monitoring and communication system, must operate without failure under the harsh conditions of the open sea. For the control system, this must be achieved. However, high reliability not only means that there is a hardware system with automatic fault prevention, but also the operating system must meet the long-term continuous operation

the first offshore wind farm in Germany is located in the North Sea (45 kilometers north of Borkum Island), which is currently under the construction of Doti, a joint venture composed of three energy companies, Germany, ewe and Sweden Vattenfall. In the coming year, 12 5MW wind turbines will be combined to generate electricity, providing power supply to 50000 households. According to the project schedule, the platform system with substation needs to be completed by the end of September 2008. The platform mainly includes ship dock, helipad, workshop and other infrastructure. It is the logistics center of alpha Ventus offshore wind farm. This platform needs to ensure that ships and helicopters can safely dock without any problems in bad weather conditions. The offshore platform is 60 meters high and 30 meters deep underwater, equipped with a very reliable lighting system and a disaster protection and monitoring system, and the system of bekale has well undertaken the above tasks; The special control system based on bekale technology is responsible for collecting and processing beacon signals and monitoring equipment signals, and transmitting them to the main control room of the wind farm located on land

"obviously, the beacon lights of aircraft take-off and landing runways must work without failure", said Peter klenk, founder of klenk group and general manager of klenk airport equipment GmbH. "simply turning on and off the corresponding beacon lights is certainly not enough, but this is not obvious."

complex control equipment

according to different airport categories, local regulations and standards are also different. The current project must take into account the system's test system, such as related insulation test and light fault test

"the controller not only needs to control hundreds of beacon lights and process many signals, but also can ensure that the main control room receives error reports within one second in case of alarm or emergency, such as power failure", Peter klenk explained. Therefore, the controller must operate quickly and effectively

then why not consider a standard PC to handle such a task? Manager Peter klenk explained as follows: "even if a higher standard industrial PC is selected, the reliability of the system cannot be guaranteed. After running for a period of time, the PC hardware will have problems or the operation will be slower or even paralyzed than the traditional modified plastic working system." Such a situation cannot be avoided even if the PC is not connected and interconnected and other software is not installed

access security system and video monitoring system of the helipad: all system tasks are transmitted to the controller through the X20 i/o of baccalais

risk factors of using commercial PC operating system

airport technical experts are still hesitant about using redundant structure or complex PC server system with raid function, even with other security measures: "In addition to the PC crash problem to be solved, the expensive initial cost and complex on-site maintenance are also problems. It may be feasible to drive the precision screw pair for experiments in large airports with sufficient personnel, but for regional airports or offshore platforms, it is unacceptable to spend thousands of euros on each configuration, and also need to be equipped with special maintenance personnel. It is completely reliable and reasonable The cost of constitutes a necessary criterion here. "

as a result, the experts of klenk company began to look for optional hardware platforms for the airport control system (ACS), and finally adopted the overall solution based on baccalais power panel and X20 i/o system. Peter klenk explained, "this solution is very suitable for us - high reliability, integrated peripheral equipment and display unit (HMI) It can also reflect the excellent flexibility of this scheme. Even if the on-site distribution cabinet is far away from the control center, it is easy to diagnose or debug. Not only do the products of baccalais have extremely high quality and excellent cost performance, but they do seriously consider our project needs and actively provide us with the required support, even though we are not part of their core customer base at present. "

pioneering spirit and flexibility

alpha Ventus (offshore wind farm) project is a groundbreaking project; Therefore, everyone in the project is required to be flexible and dedicated. Peter klenk stressed: "the North Sea oil drilling platform has been equipped with a helipad, but that technology is not quite the same as the project requirements of alpha Ventus."

in this project, the lighting of the apron and the control of the marine lighthouse used to help ships or helicopters arrive safely are continuous and error free. The controller of each platform also needs to be controlled by the marine traffic management system of klenk company located in the control center. These two systems are not independent of each other. "We have accumulated rich experience in the field of domestic and international aviation standards, which helps us develop our own airport control system (ACS)," said the business department manager of klenk

compared with oil drilling platforms, this offshore platform system has one biggest difference: unattended; Until the start of power generation, the platform was unattended, and in the future operation, only a small number of maintenance personnel were deployed on the platform. Closed structure can solve the problem of illegal intrusion, but because international law requires similar offshore platforms to provide corresponding rescue channels, the platform structure must be open. The solution is: once the personnel appear on the platform, Huang qingzhe, the technical director of Nuoji Tire Trading (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. with motion sensing, believes that the access security system and video monitoring system of the device will send an alarm. The alarm will be received through the X20 i/o system of baccalais, and immediately transmitted to the klenk management system in the central control room for analysis, and then inform the control station of potential safety problems and dangerous situations. This alone is not enough. If there is a problem with the power supply on the platform, such as the emergency generator on the platform is enabled, or even the built-in UPS power supply is enabled, or the communication with the control center fails, the field controller on the platform will transmit the corresponding error information to the control center on land in time

at present, the first offshore wind farm in Germany in the North Sea is under construction

a comprehensive solution based on bekalet technology

"since the platform is unattended, we have also integrated a weather station in the system, which can automatically send the on-site climate conditions to the pilots by radio before the aircraft lands," Peter klenk added. In addition to the helipad, maritime aids to navigation, met system (weather station) and video monitoring system, klenk company has also configured a communication system for radio communication between ships and aircraft and a special refueling pipeline on each platform

at the beginning of 2009, when the first offshore wind farm in Germany was still under construction, this offshore platform had begun to play an important role

"in this project, as a qualified supplier, we have proved that we can flexibly provide complete solutions in the field of navigation and aviation, but its monotonous color and relatively heavy weight are shortcomings that designers have been unable to break through," Peter klenk said proudly, "and also laid a foundation for higher-level cooperation with baccalais in the future."

klenk Company Profile:

time of establishment: 1981

number of employees: about 35

Company Address: Nordholz and bodneg rotheidlen (Germany)

Products & Services: AIDS to navigation and airport equipment, factory and gas station construction

address: (end)