Energies, Vol. 18, Pages 4295: Icing Monitoring of Wind Turbine Blade Based on Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors and Strain Ratio Index

Energies, Vol. 18, Pages 4295: Icing Monitoring of Wind Turbine Blade Based on Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors and Strain Ratio Index

Energies doi: 10.3390/en18164295

Authors:
Yadi Tian
Zhaohui Zhang
Xiaojing Wang
Wanheng Li
Yang Xu

In cold regions, the power generation efficiency of wind turbines is affected by blade icing. Heavy icing on blades will change the aerodynamic configuration of the blades and can even cause blades to crack or break. Therefore, monitoring and deicing technologies are important for the safe operation of wind turbines. This study proposes a novel strain ratio index based on mechanical analysis of icing, which causes the neutral axis shift and different strain ratio change between waving and shimmy directions. Data from the 5 kW wind turbine blade model in a low-temperature laboratory and the 1.5 MW full-scale field wind turbine monitoring over 1 year are used to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. The proposed strain ratio index and icing detection criteria are derived from mechanical analysis with clear interpretability while reducing ambiguity from structural damage. The relationship between the strain ratio index and ice thickness is quantified through laboratory tests and validated by field applications, demonstrating the effectiveness and robustness under complex real-world service scenarios.