Chinese company Mingyang Smart Energy has announced plans to build the world’s largest offshore wind turbine.
The unit would have a rotor diameter of 280m and would be able to supply power to around 100,000 people.
The machine was unveiled by the turbine maker on Friday where it was billed as an attempt to “move beyond the 18MW threshold”.
The previous holder of the size record for turbines was Chinese company Goldwind, which unveiled a unit with a rotor diameter of 236m in October last year. This was an advance beyond a 15MW turbine manufactured by Danish wind energy company Vesta, which had a diameter of 236m.
According to Mingyang, the “MySE 18.X-28X” unit will turn at a speed of 8.5m/s, generating 80GWh a year.
The new massive turbine is also billed as a cheaper alternative to lots of smaller turbines.
“When compared to the installation of 13MW models, the higher output of the MySE18.X-28X would save 18 units required for a 1GW wind farm, shaving off construction costs by $120,000-150,000 per megawatt,” Mingyang said.
The turbine will have a lightweight modular design, as well as the use of holographic sensing and digital twin technology to optimise its operations.
It has been designed to survive extreme weather conditions, including typhoons with wind speeds greater that 200km/h.
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