Direct Drive Wind Turbine Market with Current Trends Analysis,2015-20 FMI | Page 3

Report
Description
Report Description
Wind is one the fastest-growing energy sources in the world. With the accelerating
electricity consumption and increasing threat from the green-house effect and
consequential environmental degradation, all the industries are stepping forward into the
reduction of energy consumption and loss of energy. Though increasing the energy
production will meet the demand but it will lead to increased strain on non-renewable
energy sources and hence the environment. Commercially more than 80 countries are
now utilizing the wind energy for electricity-generation. Technological developments
have made it possible for more effective and reliable equipment and machinery, which
has resulted in the growth of the wind energy market.

Traditionally the electricity generation from wind energy was made possible by gearboxoperated wind turbines. In the gearbox-operated wind turbines, the shaft is connected
through a gearbox to the generator. This makes the gearbox as the highest-maintenance
part of a wind turbine, as it consists of multiple wheels and bearings; due to which it
suffers from tremendous stress because of wind turbulence. Any defect in a single
component can halt the functioning of the wind turbine. In offshore turbines, the
gearboxes have to withstand faster wind speeds; making it even more vulnerable than
those in onshore turbines. Technically, removal of the gearbox from the wind turbine will
eliminate the most complicated part of the machine. This will result in improved
reliability by cutting downtime and repair costs; which is an especially important
consideration for offshore turbines, where it’s quite expensive to send technicians for the
maintenance. But using direct drive instead of a gearbox system has its own challenges
namely cost and weight concerns.