Reliability Based Maintenance Planning of Wind Turbine Using Bond Graph

Wind power generation is an effective form of clean, renewable energy which operates both on land and offshore. The primary means of converting wind to power is by wind turbines. The issue with wind turbines is high uncertainty of operating environment resulting in low life cycle reliability. Frequent breakdown failures resulting in reactive maintenance is costly which results in downtime and loss of production. FMEA has been used in some cases to develop maintenance schedule but the effect is minimal. This paper investigates a new method of determining faults from adverse operating conditions by bond graph model and combines with the concept of failure mode and effects analysis to simulate the effects of maintenance strategies on the mean time to failure of wind turbine components. The mean time to failure data can then be used to refine the maintenance task with additional inspections and replacements that can prevent breakdown failures and maximize the utilization rate of expensive components.