Demonstration of a self-erection system for wind turbine towers

ended

"One of the main wind market trends is to increase the size of wind turbines in order to take full advantage of available wind resources and thus improve the COE. However, such increase has led to a number of limitations, both technical and economic, in the installation of towers over 120 m, which result in a bottleneck that paralyses this market trend. Large cranes are used for the installation of all types of towers, which result in significant cost overrun in the installation of towers higher than 120 m and limiting the installation of towers higher than 140 m, thus, paralyzing the development of the sector. In this area, NABRAWIND has developed an effective, reliable and with a competitive cost system that enables assembling any type of wind turbine tower, nacelle included, without any limitation in height and with complete independence from auxiliary cranes, thanks to a new lifting concept system based on hydraulic lifting mechanism which allows the system to operate from the ground. The overall objective of this project is the demonstration to ""stakeholders"" of the functionality and reliability of the final configuration of the new self-erection system for the construction of wind towers in a real operational environment with the aim to confirm that the design specifications and requirements of the application are fulfilled. "