At the end of the last month, innogy sent a drone to inspect the blades on a turbine at the Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm for the first time.
The drone inspection had been carried out as an alternative for rope-access blade inspection.
“If the rotor blade expert is close to the blade and can immediately see it at close range, this is of course the best option. However, the rope-access inspection is very complex. With the drone, we are hoping to save time and thus lower production loss,” said Wolf Kind , Senior Asset Integrity Manager for the Nordsee Ost wind farm.
In the coming days, innogy will look at the visual material to assess whether the quality and significance of the images is sufficient, and then the company will decide whether to further use the drone for visual inspection of offshore wind turbines.
The 295MW Nordsee Ost is located around 35 kilometres to the north-east of the island of Helgoland in the German North Sea region. It comprises 48 Senvion 6.2M 126 turbines.
Offshore WIND Staff