Wind Turbines 

To date, the electricity derived from wind is considered to be the most cost efficient source or renewable energy the world has today. To make an illustration, wind power plants does not take large land mass to operate compare to solar energy, but one single wind turbine can provide usable energy to 600 domestic homes. 

We’ve been using wind turbines for thousands of years. While early wind turbines left much to be desired, today’s advanced technologies are powering us to a cleaner future. 

The world has been getting their source of electricity from wind power plants for thousands of years. With the recent changes and technology developments in renewable energy industry it is expected that wind power plants will improve over the course of time. 

How does Wind Turbines work? 

Most of the time, the turbines in wind power plants are installed on a privately owned land. The constructions of these turbines mostly comprises of two to three humongous aerodynamic propeller blades. These blades are then connected to a rotor, and the rotor is lined to a generator inside the main shaft of the wind turbine. 

Once the wind turbines’ blades were turned by the wind, it automatically turns the rotor on. This machine helps converting the kinetic energy into mechanical energy. The rotor is the one responsible for driving the generator which converts the mechanical energy to a usable electricity. The flow of electricity travels as a direct current to down the interior of the wind turbine tower base.  

Once the electricity hits the tower base, a machine is responsible to turning direct current to an alternating current. It is called converter. Then a transformer that can be found inside the wind power plant sends the alternating current of electricity to consumers by raising the voltage for transport. It now sends to substation which is responsible for allocating and distributing usable energy to final consumers. 

What are electrical enclosures used for Wind Turbines? 

The two of the most important things any design engineers should consider for electrical enclosures used in wind power plants are weather and weight. It is important that an electrical enclosure should be light weight and weather-resistant because of the possible haphazard in wind power plants. 

Most of the time, wind turbines in wind power plants are required to be exposed to harsh and extreme environments. Because of this, electrical equipment requires rugged type of protection from electrical enclosures. Usually, companies that use electrical equipment in environments where there is a possible ingress of water or any foreign object, formation of sleet and snow may require the use of NEMA 4 enclosures. However, wind turbines that are near the see or marine environments should have a NEMA 4X rated enclosure because there is a possible corrosion for the equipments. 

Also, there are times where wind power plants use controllers via remote computer monitoring systems to control turbines and transmit information from the machine to the users – such as temperature and speed of the turbine blades. With this in mind, it is recommended to use key for enclosures to protect these remote devices.