Turbine Fire at The Netherlands' Largest Offshore Wind Farm 

A year after commissioning the largest offshore wind farm in the Netherlands, and the second-largest operating offshore wind farm in the world, Ørsted is reporting that a fire damaged one of the wind turbines. The turbine malfunctioned the company reports causing the fire. A total of three turbines are now offline out of a total of 94 with the remainder of the farm continuing to operate.

“No employees were present when the fire broke out and no one was injured,” Ørsted said in a brief statement about the incident. The energy company that developed the site approximately 15 miles off the Dutch coast reports that it is working with the wind turbine manufacturer Siemens Gamesa to investigate the cause of the failure.

The damaged wind turbine is being dismantled to possibly reuse some of its parts. They are also working on the two other turbines that were linked to the damaged unit to restore them to operations. An inspection shows that they did not suffer any damage during the incident and appear to be able to operate normally.

Ørsted completed the commissioning of the Borssele 1 & 2 offshore wind farm in November 2020. The wind farm has a capacity of 752 MW, using Siemens Gamesa 8 MW turbines. The turbines are on monopiles in a water depth ranging between 45 and 115 feet of water.

Fires from the failures of the turbines happen periodically most often due to machinery failure. A report in Windpower Engineering and Turbine said that they had been 379 fires reported over the last 20 years. Experts believe the actual number is higher with incidents going unreported due to fears that it would damage the reputation of the industry.