English - Nooteboom Giants on the Road Magazine English - Nr. 6 - 2019 | Page 38

GIANTS ON THE ROAD
Transporting windturbines by sea
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WEIGHT SAVING
Wind turbines have become heavier during the last few years. A 7.5 MW
version with a concrete/steel tower weighs approx. 6,000 tonnes. 2,500
tonnes are hidden in the foundation, the tower weighs 2,800 tonnes and
the generator and rotor blades weigh almost 400 tonnes. Future towers
will weigh less. Vestas is working on a prototype that is secured to the
ground with cables from halfway up the tower. Modular construction
or moving the generator to the bottom of the tower could lead to weight
reductions.
THE IMPLICATIONS FOR TRANSPORT COMPANIES
Wind energy provides a growing share of our energy needs. But the most
important step is still to come: a competitive cost price compared with
Abnormal transport by rail and inland waterways
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the power generated from fossil fuels. We are now making that step. In
the last decade the cost of wind energy has decreased by more than 50%
and it will come down even further. Transport companies and crane hire
companies account for part of those lower costs. Transport costs will
continue to be under pressure, as only a handful of European windmill
producers can choose from the services of several hundreds of transport
companies. The transport operator has several options to survive this
fierce competition. The first one is to have a higher capacity utilisation
for the specialised equipment that is needed for the transport of tower
sections, the nacelle or the rotor blades. The second option is to use
multifunctional equipment so that the trailer can be used in the wind
industry as well as for other transports. The third – perhaps the most
important – option is to use multimodal transport more often. Rotor
blades up to approx. 70m are still transported over the road. 107m long
rotor blades will be coming soon. For the time being these rotor blades
are only used for offshore windmills. Long, wide and heavy transports
are often easier to transport by water, subject to the height restrictions
of the clearance under bridges. A German windmill manufacturer has
recently experimented with a dolly underneath a self-supporting rotor
blade.
To put the rotor blades at an angle when negotiating tricky parts of the
route will also be used more often. ALE has developed a new technology
for the transport of very large loads over complicated routes: the Route
Survey Tool. This tool provides a detailed electronic analysis of the
route beforehand. The separate Driver Assist Tool offers the drivers the
opportunity to prepare themselves for the route. In brief: windmills
are getting bigger, but their transport has to become cheaper and more
efficient.
NOOTEBOOM
Nooteboom began in 1990 as the first trailer producer with the
development of special solutions for the transport of windmills.
The Mega Windmill Transporter was a huge success for the transport of
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The trend is higher capacities and longer wings, the longest ones are now 107m long