Turbine manufacturers take countless precautions to prevent fires in wind turbines. But fires still happen. They can never be completely engineered out.

When a wind turbine catches on fire, it is no match for conventional fire fighting methods. Newer wind turbines stand, on average, nearly 150 meters from the base to the tip. The height and location of wind turbines create a unique set of fire safety challenges.

With the capacity of wind turbines increasing, the risk of fire also increases. Fires in wind turbines are the second leading cause of accidents after blade failure and are ahead of structural failure.

Height of Nacelle, Location of the farm makes it difficult to fight against the fire

Usually, firefighters are there just to protect the region

A fire in nacelle destroys 90% of the turbine

There are compostite materials and 900 liters of lubricating oil and other highly flammable liquids held on the walls of the engine room and in the engine room.

These materials in a wind turbine are also risk factors.

A source of ignition is all that is needed to start a fire.

Approximately 120 wind turbines catch fire every year. This creates 24% of annual wind turbine accidents. When lightning protection systems are not installed or maintained it puts the wind turbine at a higher risk of fire. Other factors that cause fire in wind turbine;

• Short circuits
• Arc in transformer
• Electrical equipment overload or overheating
• Insufficient lubrication between bearing surfaces causing overheating and sparks
• Generator failure
• Mechanical brake system error

• Wind Turbines are expensive and high value systems
• A fire costs 4.5 M USD
• Fire is the second most frequent fault
• 18 month for starting back to work
• 1-3% possibility of fire in a lifetime of turbine

• There is no standards for wind turbines
• NFPA 850 is the most suitible one
• 3msec – 30 seconds detection time
• 55.000 fire extinguishing system on the field
• Half million wind turbines in the globe