Design optimization of composite wind turbine blades considering tortuous lightning strike and non-proportional multi-axial fatigue damage. Issue 11 (1st November 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Hu, Weifei; Zhao, Wentao; Wang, Yeqing; Liu, Zhenyu; Cheng, Jin; Tan, Jianrong
• Is Part Of: Engineering optimization. Volume 52:Issue 11(2020)
• Page Start: 1868
• Page End: 1886
• Publication Date: 2020-11-01
• Subjects: Composite material -- lightning strike -- wind turbine fatigue -- sequential quadratic programming -- Bayesian optimization; Engineering design -- Periodicals; Mathematical optimization -- Periodicals; 620.0042
• DOI: 10.1080/0305215X.2019.1690649
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0305-215X

Abstract

Abstract : This article presents a design optimization framework which integrates realistic lightning strike electrostatic and fatigue analyses for designing reliable and economical composite wind turbine blades. The novel aspects of this work include: a parametric tortuous lightning stepped leader model that reflects one of the true natural characteristics of the lightning phenomenon; and characterization of both the lightning strike dielectric breakdown failure and multi-axial fatigue failure mechanisms for structural design of composite wind turbine blades. A case study of the structural design optimization of a 5 MW composite wind turbine blade is tested using the framework with two optimization solvers: sequential quadratic programming (SQP) and Bayesian optimization (BO). SQP produces a superior optimal design to BO. In the optimum blade design based on the SQP algorithm, the lightning safety ratio increased by 32% and the expected fatigue life increased more than 15 times compared with the initial blade design.