09 Jul BLAEST selected to test the world’s largest wind turbine rotor blade

Blade Test Centre A/S (BLAEST) will be performing full scale structural testing of LM Wind Power’s new LM 88.4 P rotor blade which is the world’s largest.

The blade has been specifically designed for Adwen’s AD 8-180 wind turbine model, which has the largest rotor in the market leading to the highest Annual Energy Production (AEP), greatly contributing to lowering the Levelized Cost of Energy of offshore wind power.

The blade arrived at our test centre in Aalborg, Denmark 1st July after successful road transportation from LM Wind Power in Lunderskov, Denmark.
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”This short video summarizes the impressive transport across Denmark. Video footage courteously provided by LM Wind Power.”

The full scale structural blade testing is a mandatory part of the type certification process. The test programme defined in the IEC 61400-23 standard covers extreme as well as fatigue loading to demonstrate that the blade can withstand all operational offshore load conditions throughout the lifetime of the wind turbine.

“We are extremely proud to be selected as LM Wind Power’s collaboration partner for the blade testing”, says BLAEST’s Managing Director, Erik Steen Jensen. “We will use our more than 30 years of experience within blade testing to take the 88.4 m blade through the tests safely and efficiently. When performing complicated tests on such large structures, you always face unexpected situations, where you need to react promptly, be flexible and customer oriented. That’s exactly what we are known for.”

LM Wind Power is the leading independent, global supplier of blades for wind turbines. Since 1978, LM Wind Power has produced more than 185,000 blades, corresponding to approximately 77 GW of installed wind power capacity. Today, almost every fifth turbine in the world is fitted with LM Wind Power blades.

Please follow link to more information about the LM 88.4 P blade http://www.lmwindpower.com/en/products-and-services/blade-types

Adwen is a 50-50 joint-venture of AREVA and Gamesa dedicated to offshore wind. Adwen is responsible for the design, manufacturing, installation, commissioning and services of offshore wind turbines. Combining both AREVA and Gamesa wind expertise and extensive track-record, Adwen is ideally positioned to become a leading player in the offshore wind segment with the objective of garnering a market share of close to 20% in Europe by 2020.