China’s wind energy hardware maker, MingYang Smart Energy has announced an offshore wind turbine that will be even bigger than GE’s gigantic Haliade-X. It will be the world’s largest wind turbine to power 20,000 homes per unit over a 25-year functional life.
The 16-megawatt, 242-meter-tall humongous wind turbine is expected to power homes by 2023. The 118-meter-long blades of the massive wind turbine would cover a total of 46,000 square-meter of area when in motion. To simplify, this is larger than six soccer fields.
Image: MingYang Smart Energy
The big turbines are proficient enough to produce 80-gigawatt hours, whereas Haliade-X by GE only generates 74-gigwatt hours. Each of the turbines is capable of powering a combined 20,000 homes over a course of 25 years.
Qiying Zhang, President and CTO of MingYang Smart Energy, said;
The launch of our new largest wind turbine, MySE 16.0-242, is an apt illustration of the three essential drivers to technology evolution – demand, combination and iteration. Over the years, we have gained over 10GW cumulative track record and iteration experience with Hybrid-Drive technology. These enable us to have a rapid learning curve in product R&D and position us well to become an offshore wind leader.
Moreover, it is efficient of generating 45 percent more electricity than the company’s MySE turbines, by just ranging the blades by 19 meters in diameter.
According to the company, one of these wind turbines can eliminate over 1.6 million tons of carbon emissions throughout its operational life. Besides, the entire thing weighs low at merely 37 tons per megawatt, which enables more efficient use of the tower and foundation edifice.
The construction of this wind turbine would be a huge stride to near the renewable energy global goals, which would be of a great help amid the rapidly changing climatic patterns and their impact on the planet and all of its inhabitant.
Via: India Times