Analysis of the Benefits of Fault-Tolerant
Converters in Offshore Wind Turbines
John Warnock David McMillan
Wind Energy Systems DTC University of Strathclyde,
University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland
Glasgow, Scotland david.mcmillan@strath.ac.uk
john.warnock@strath.ac.uk
Abstract – The converter in a large variable-
speed wind turbine has amongst the highest
failure rate of any component, but in an onshore
setting it has not received much attention as
repairs can be carried out quickly and with
minimal equipment. In an offshore wind farm,
access is by boat or helicopter, which is
significantly more expensive and may be
restricted by high winds or wave heights. This
means that converter failures offshore will cost
more to fix, and potentially also lead to a greater
downtime, leading to loss of revenue. Converters
can be designed to be modular and to feature
fault-tolerance, where the turbine can continue
running at reduced power after a fault in one
converter module, or fully redundant, in which
the turbine can continue at full power. The
purpose of this project is to investigate the
effects of using such converters on the turbine
downtime, maintenance cost and lost revenue.
Index Terms - Converters, Cost benefit analysis,
Fault tolerance, Redundancy, Reliability
analysis
I. INTRODUCTION
In large offshore turbines there is typically a
need for several converters and since the converters
in said large turbines have amongst the highest
failure rates of all of the turbine components,
failures will occur and eventually lead to turbine
downtime. This can prove problematic offshore,
especially in the larger turbines being proposed in
the round 3 wind farms such as Dogger Bank
which is 3,343 square miles in size and at its
closest point to shore is 78 miles and at its furthest
is around 180 miles from shore [1]. At such a huge
distance from shore and with such a vast area the
downtimes will depend largely upon the sea
conditions and the availability of transport to the
location of the fault to carry out maintenance. This
could potentially lead to a massive loss of energy
production. To combat this it has been proposed
Max Parker
University of Strathclyde,
Glasgow, Scotland
max.parker@strath.ac.uk
that fault-tolerance is introduced into these
turbines.
Generally the converter set up within any fully
rated wind turbine will include a series of parallel
switching modules which will house the converter
components such as the IGBTs, gate drives and
capacitors. This will typically be connected to a
general system controller and cooled via an air or
liquid cooling system, which will depend on the
turbine manufacturer and the location of the
turbine.
To include fault-tolerance a local controller
will be implemented alongside the converter
switching modules; this will allow the turbine to
operate under certain faults at a lower rating. Fault-
tolerance will come with a cost however this paper
investigates the costs and benefits associated with
implementing fault tolerance in several offshore
wind turbines of different ratings.
Another method to reduce downtimes, which
has already been implemented in wind turbines, is
the concept of converter redundancy [2]. In a
redundant set up there will be one or more
additional converters which are not operating and
will only begin to operate should one of the already
operational converters fail.
II. RELIABILITY MODELLING
In any kind of reliability engineering the model
can be defined as a combination of series and
parallel reliability blocks. If a component is
connected in series then should it fail then the
entire system in which it is in series with will fail.
Should a component be connected in parallel and
experiences any kind of failure, provided the other
components which are also connected in parallel do
not fail then the system will continue to operate.
Using this, a model of the converters within various
different wind turbine set ups could be modelled
and analysed.
III. WIND TURBINE
CONFIGURATION
Throughout the analysis three different wind
turbine configurations were considered, namely a
1.5MW turbine, a 3.6MW turbine, which was
modelled on the Siemens 3.6MW offshore wind
turbine and then altered to incorporate fault-
tolerance and redundancy, as was the case for the
6MW turbine.
The 1.5MW turbine configuration was
modelled such that without introducing the capacity
for redundancy there would be a general controller,
a cooling system and three identical branches each
of which including a local controller and a
switching module on the generator side. There
would also be an identical number of parallel
branches on the grid side. The switching module
essentially includes all of the converter components
such as IGBTs, capacitors etc. for this reason the
reliability block diagram simply includes the
reliability of the switching module as opposed to
overcomplicating the model by introducing the
components within the switching modules. To add
redundancy to this configuration one parallel
branch including a local controller and a switching
module was added in parallel with the existing
branches, both on the generator side and the grid
side.
In the case of the 3.6MW wind turbine the
model was built using the configuration of the
Siemens equivalent and altered slightly to introduce
fault tolerance. As with the 3.6MW turbine, the
6MW turbine was based on the Siemens equivalent
and modified to include fault tolerance as well as
redundancy.
Firstly the impact of introducing
redundant fault-tolerant converters into a system
was analysed such that the reliability of the system
for each different configuration could be
established. The failure rates of the various
components had to be established from literature as
this is a theoretical system. The failure rates taken
from “Reliability of Megawatt Drive Concepts” by
Klug and Mertens, 2003 [3] had to be converted
from the value given as failures in time (FIT) to
failures per turbine per year. This was relatively
straight forward and simply required basic
arithmetic. Other figures, such as the failure rate of
the switching modules were taken from
“Investigation of converter failure in wind
turbines” by Fischer et al, 2012 [4].
Using these failure rates and assuming that
each of the components reliability deteriorates
exponentially over time the overall reliability of the
system could be calculated. Firstly the individual
component reliabilities had to be calculated using:
𝑅(𝑡) = 𝑒 −𝜆𝑡 {1}
Where R(t) is the reliability of a component as a
function of time, λ is the failure rate and t is quite
simply time [3],[5]. Using this value of reliability
the model can start to take shape, what must then
be considered is how to model the series
components of the model [5],
𝑅𝑠 = 𝑅1 ∗ 𝑅2 ∗ 𝑅3 ∗ ⋯ ∗ 𝑅𝑛 {2}
Since this is a simple multiplication, equations 1
and 2 can be combined to give
𝑅(𝑡) = 𝑒 −(𝜆1+𝜆2+𝜆3+⋯+𝜆𝑛)𝑡 {3}
This representation of the series reliability can be
particularly useful when there are multiple
components as it will save coding and
computational time. It is also important when
modelling the reliability of a system is how to
represent the parallel reliability [5]:
𝑅𝑝 = 1 − (1 − 𝑅1 )(1 − 𝑅2 ) ⋯ (1 − 𝑅𝑛 ) {4}
The values of R1 etc. are not to be confused with
those of the series system. Given each of the
parallel branches are identical this can be
simplified to
𝑅𝑝 = 1 − (1 − 𝑅𝑠 )𝑛 {5}
Where n is the number of parallel branches being
modelled.
Using the failure rates taken from
literature with the model of the system described
previously the following results were observed for
the overall system for a varying number of parallel
branches:
Reliability of Proposed System
0.8
0.7 Series System
System with 2 parallel branches
System with 3 parallel branches
0.6
System with 4 parallel branches
Reliability (Failures/Turbine)
0.5
System with 5 parallel branches
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5
Time (Years)
Figure 1: Reliability of proposed system given a
changing number of parallel branches
It can be seen that there is a large difference in
the reliability of a purely series system and one
which has parallel components as expected.
However it can be seen that the number of branches
is increased the increase in reliability is
diminishing and as such there will be a point at
which the increased costs outweigh the increased
reliability. For example in this instance this would
be at four parallel braches as the difference
between the reliability of four branches and five
branches is almost unnoticeable.
IV. COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS
Once the optimal number of parallel branches had
been determined a cost benefit could be carried out.
Firstly assumptions had to be made regarding the
costing of various different components; these
figures were deduced from figures given in
Comparison of Direct-Drive and Geared Generator
Concepts for Wind Turbines by Polinder et al. [6].
Using these figures the overall converter cost for
the turbine could be calculated through simple
arithmetic. The average annual energy capture was
then calculated for a turbine with a normal
converter set-up, a set-up which included fault-
tolerance and finally including both fault-tolerance
and redundancy. To do this some assumptions had
to be made:
The initial assumption was that the
capacity factor remained constant throughout the
entire year. Whilst this is clearly not the case the
annual capacity factor was taken to be the Danish
average offshore capacity factor between July 2013
and June 2014 of 46.9% [7]. Another of the
assumptions made was that as the turbine size and
rating increased, the cost of the general controller
and cooling system would scale linearly. Whilst
the system would be fault-tolerant it is unclear at
which rating it would operate given it was in a
fault-tolerant state and as such the converter was
taken to be 50% operational under any given fault.
Another of the key assumptions was due
to the nature of the data provided. Whether or not a
converter – or turbine in general – is capable of
operating under a fault would of course depend
upon the nature of the fault and how many faults
have occurred. From the onshore data provided
over 90% of the turbines only experienced one
downtime related to converter faults whilst the
Benefits of Introducing Fault-Tolerance and Redundancy Offshore
60,000 €
50,000 €
Overall Cost Benefit
40,000 €
30,000 €
20,000 €
10,000 €
0€
Fault-Tolerance
Cost Benefit - 1.5MW
# pBranches - 1.5MW
Figure 2: Benefits of Introducing Fault-Tolerance and Redundancy Offshore
remainder of the turbines experienced two
converter related downtimes. In most cases it was
assumed that the nature of the fault would result in
either fault-tolerant operation or would require a
level of redundancy. Any other faults were
assumed to result in turbine downtime. It was from
this assumption that the additional uptime and as
such energy captured during this time was
calculated for each of the converter configurations.
The final and perhaps most important assumption
made was regarding the downtimes of the onshore
data provided and how to relate these to an offshore
environment. Whilst it has been discussed
previously that the very naute of the offshore
environment could lead to several weeks
downtime, it was assumed that any failure which
occurs onshore would lead to three times the
downtime offshore.
The average energy capture was then
multiplied by the wholesale price of energy which
was taken to be 181€/MWh [8] and the renewable
obligation certificates (ROCs) were taken into
account at the value of 51.33€/ROC [8] where
offshore ROCs were taken as 2 ROCs/MWh of
electricity produced as per the Department of
Energy and Climate Change bandings [9]. The
monetary output of the turbine with each different
converter configuration was then compared. The
difference in converter costs was then subtracted
from the difference in energy output given the
additional energy capture with the alternative
configurations and the results shown in figure 2
were observed.
18
15
Number of Parallel Branches
12
9
6
3
0
Fault-Tolerance with Redundancy
Cost Benefit - 3.6MW Cost Benefit - 6MW
# pBranches - 3.6MW # pBranches - 6MW
 V. DISCUSSION VII. REFERENCES

Considering the reliability of any given converter
set up within a wind turbine it is evident that as the
number of parallel branches is increased the
observed increase in system reliability is
diminishing, for example, after 4 or 5 branches are
reached in the case of the 1.5MW model. This is
interesting as a 1.5MW turbine would typically
require at least 3 branches to operate at rated
power, and could not operate with any less than 2
branches. Hence it can be deduced that in any wind
turbine configuration there will be a point at which
there will be a greater cost than benefit. From the
results of the reliability calculations and cost
benefit analysis it is the maximum number of
redundant branches appears to be 4/3 of the number
of branches required for rated operation. As with
any more branches there would be a cost incurred
whislt any fewer branches would be somehwat
illogical, including one branch of redundancy in a
6MW wind turbine which has 12 branches either
side would incur a much smaller cost but would
lead to larger downtimes in the event of a failure of
more than one converter branch. However it is
important to note that these results rely heavily
upon the assumptions made during the calculations.
The assumptions made, which have been listed
previously, could have been vastly improved. The
capacity factor and ability to access the turbine
could have been improved by altering the data to
include seasonal variatons in weather conditions.
Given that the wind speed will be higher and more
constant during the winter months, the capacity
factor during this time would have been
significantly higher however the failures may have
been more frequent due to increased loading on the
converters and due to the weather conditions this
would have lead to much greater downtimes for
each of the turbines.
VI. CONCLUSIONS
[1] Forewind Annual Review. June 2014 Accessed
on: 24/07/2014 Accessed from:
http://www.forewind.co.uk/uploads/FOR_final%20
Annual%20Review_2014.pdf
[2] F. Blaabjerg, M. Liserre, K. Ma: “Power
Electronics Converters for Wind Turbine Systems”,
IEEE Transactions on industry applications. Vol.
48, No. 2 March/April 2012
[3] R.-D. Klug, A. Mertens: “Reliability of
Megawatt Drive Concepts”, IEEE 2003
[4] K. Fischer, T. Stalin, H. Ramsberg, T. Tjiringer,
J. Wenske, R. Karlsson: “Investigation of converter
failure in wind turbines”, Nov 2012, pg. 29
[5] R. Billinton, A. N. Allan: “Reliability
Evaluation of Engineering Systems”, 2nd Ed, 1993
[6] H. Polinder, F. van der Pijl, G.-J. de Vilder, &
Tavner, P. J.: “Comparison of Direct-Drive and
Geared Generator Concepts for Wind Turbines.”,
IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion, 21(3),
pp. 725-733. 2006
[7] Capacity factors at Danish offshore wind farms.
Accessed on: 04/07/14. Accessed from:
http://energynumbers.info/capacity-factors-at-
danish-offshore-wind-farms
[8] European Commission. Energy prices and costs
in Europe. March 2014
[9] Department of Energy and Climate Change,
New Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROCs)
table. September 2012.

The findings of this investiagtion would suggest

that there is a marginal benefit to the
implementation of fault-tolerance and redundancy.
It is thought that a combination of both would be
largely benficial offshore especially during the
winter months where access to the wind turbine for
repairs is significantly longer than that during the
summer months. The next step with this
investigation would be to use a similar method with
a slightly less crude method of estimating the
offshore downtime and obtaining more results for
more wind turbines. This could be particularly
useful when looking at the upcoming round 3
offshore wind farms.