Effect of Wind Turbine Blade Rotation on Triggering Lightning: An Experimental Study

Xishan Wen, Lu Qu, Yu Wang, Xiaoyue Chen, Lei Lan, Tianjun Si and Jianwei Xu
Additional contact information
Xishan Wen: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Lu Qu: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Yu Wang: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Xiaoyue Chen: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Lei Lan: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Tianjun Si: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Jianwei Xu: School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China

Energies, 2016, vol. 9, issue 12, 1-15

Abstract: Compared with other lightning targets on the ground, the most notable feature of a wind turbine is that the blades are usually in a rotating state when lightning strikes. To study the mechanism of blade rotation influencing wind turbine on triggering lightning, lightning discharge comparison tests based on a typical 2-MW 1:30-scaled wind turbine model with an arching high-voltage electrode were conducted under different modes of stationary and rotating blades. Negative polarity switching impulses of 250/2500 ?s were applied to the arching electrode. The up-and-down method was adopted for 50% discharge voltage and the discharge process was observed. The experimental results showed that under the condition of a 4 m gap, the breakdown voltage decreases and the connection point of the leaders approaches the high-voltage electrode with increasing blade speed, indicating that the wind turbine’s blade rotation enhances the triggering of lightning. The analysis showed that the blade rotation could be altering the charge distribution on the blade tip, resulting in varied ascending leader development on the blade tip, which affected the discharge development process.

Keywords: wind turbine; blade; rotation; scaled test; up-and-down method (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/12/1029/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/12/1029/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:9:y:2016:i:12:p:1029-:d:84641

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().