Vestas has introduced an anti-icing solution to boost the business case for wind power plants in cold climates by removing ice-built up on the blades that would otherwise reduce wind turbines’ annual energy production (AEP).

Vestas Anti-Icing System is based on electro-thermal heating elements embedded in the laminate directly below the blade’s surface. The control system includes different operational modes allowing the heating elements to separately create the optimal heating level, increasing effectiveness and minimizing energy consumption. This results in fast and targeted anti-icing action tailored to the specific icing situation. Vestas Anti-Icing System is designed to operate both in rotation and standstill, thereby being applicable from low to high ice severity.

In most common icing conditions, Vestas Anti-Icing System ensures a minimum of 90% production retention, improving the customer’s business case certainty by reducing the Lost Production Factor. The system complies with the latest warranty guidelines.

“Vestas Anti-Icing System significantly increases the potential for wind production in many cold climate locations where the risk of icing has constrained the otherwise excellent wind resources” says Brian Daugbjerg Nielsen, Senior Product Manager in Vestas Product Management, “Leveraging our technological leadership, the Anti-icing system will provide substantial value to customers who want to maximise the wind power potential in colder climates with icing risk”.

Vestas estimates a potential market size up to 14.6GW from 2018 to 2026, mainly in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Canada.

In addition to the anti-icing system, Vestas has introduced the siting tool Vestas Ice Assessment, which uses metrological models and algorithms to ensure an industry-leading accurate and precise ice assessment down to turbine level. With the introduction of these two new in-house developed solutions, Vestas now offers the widest portfolio of cold climate solutions in the industry.

Building on 16 years of experience within cold climate and 4 GW of installed turbines in ice-prone sites (above IEA ice class II), the two new cold climate solutions are developed and optimized based on extensive performance data insights, gathered from thousands of turbines in cold climate sites.