The review of non-destructive testing techniques suitable for inspection of the wind turbine blades

Abstract

Wind power is a promising source of environmentally safe and renewable energy with a high potential. However, in order to fully exploit energy of wind power the construction elements of the wind turbine should be inspected periodically. Wind turbine blades are complicated objects for inspection because they have an arbitrary curved surface, are multi-layered, have variable thickness and are made from anisotropic materials.
The presented study covers an overview of the techniques which are used or could be used for on site condition monitoring and effective NDT of wind turbine blades. Inspection methods based on vibration analysis, thermography, X-ray imaging, acoustic emission and ultrasound are reviewed. The objective of this study is review of different NDT techniques, which are used, or could be used for non-destructive testing of wind turbine blades, taking into account the complicated structure of the wind turbine blades as well as possibility to make non-destructive testing in harsh on-site conditions.