An Approach for Fatigue Load Monitoring without

Load Measurement Devices

Nicolai Cosack, Martin Kühn
Endowed Chair of Wind Energy, Universität Stuttgart, Germany
+49 (0)711 685 68273, cosack@ifb.uni-stuttgart.de

Abstract: loads, the adoption of maintenance cycles

according to the load history and the realisation
of a basic condition monitoring by means of
A novel approach for the monitoring of wind
trend analysis of the load data. Furthermore,
turbine fatigue loads has been developed. The
the load information could also be used to
method works without the installation of
compare wind turbines in a series not only on
additional measurement devices. Instead, an
the basis of their energy production but also on
empirical relationship between standard wind
their load history. Results of such a comparison
turbine control signals and wind turbine loading
might be useful to improve the planning of
is established. Once this procedure has been
future wind farms.
established for one turbine, it should be suitable
for the estimation of fatigue loads for all
Therefore, the present research project
turbines of that type. This paper gives an
investigates methods for using easily available
overview of the basic approach as well as
turbine signals, like rotor speed, electrical
results of an estimation of single stage spectra
power, pitch angle, etc., for fatigue load
and single stage distributions for some
monitoring. The work aims to use these
important load components of a state of the art
standard wind turbine signals for the estimation
wind turbine.
of simple load indicators, such as damage
equivalent loads, but also for the more detailed
1 Introduction fatigue spectra, e.g. multi stage load duration
distributions and rainflow spectra.
Routinely, load measurements at wind turbines
are carried out only for a few prototypes as
temporary measurement campaigns. The 2 System Specification
development of cost effective and reliable
A complete fatigue load estimation system does
systems which can be used for continuous load
not only consist of an estimation procedure, but
monitoring of wind turbines has been proven to
requires also a process control and a
be a difficult task. Besides the high costs of
monitoring scheme. The general layout of such
measurement equipment and the large effort of
a system is shown in Figure 2 and described
post-processing and evaluating the collected
briefly in this section.
data, the expected lifetime of a turbine might
exceed the lifetime of standard measurement
Process Control
devices (e.g. strain gauges) by far and
replacement might not always be easy.
System Identification
Accurate estimation results can only be
Besides information about energy yield,
achieved, if the properties of the individual wind
operating hours and maintenance or repair
turbine are in good agreement with the design
activities, a wind turbine’s performance and
assumptions of the estimation system. Due to
especially its dynamic behaviour is known only
site specific conditions, such as soil properties,
from the prototype testing. This prototype
as well as to fabrication and assembly
testing does not necessarily reflect the real
tolerances, the properties of wind turbines in a
conditions in the series at particular sites. As a
series can differ to some extend. Hence an
consequence, very little or, in most cases,
exact match of the design assumptions is
nothing is known about the load history of more
virtually impossible and system identification is
than a few of the many existing turbines.
required to check that the turbine’s properties
lie within a suitable range. It should be
Measuring loads in a continuous manner offers
performed at least once prior to the initialisation
some significant benefits for the operation of a
of the estimation system and periodically if
wind turbine and can help to produce energy at
significant system degradation over time can be
lower costs. Among the most obvious
assumed.
advantages are the adjustment of turbine
operational control with respect to the current
 Figure 2: Layout of a load estimation system
The detection of immoderate rotor imbalances
by system identification can serve as a practical
example. If large imbalances are present but do
not influence the standard signals used for the
load prediction, their influence on the estimated
loads will not be captured. On the other hand, if
a standard signal is significantly influenced by
an undetected disturbance, the prediction error
is likely to be increased.
Turbine status
In order to give a complete picture, load
predictions have to be performed for all turbine
states relevant for the fatigue loading. The
relation between standard signals and loads
can be different for the various states such as
normal power production, idling, starts and
stops. It can therefore be reasonable to adopt
the estimation procedure according to the
current turbine state by treating the input data
differently or switching to other estimation
procedures.
Load estimation procedure
Statistical analysis
Because standard signals are mainly used for
control of wind turbines they are usually
measured with high resolution. These
continuous high resolution time series can
either be applied directly for the estimation or
divided into sections of equal length, usually 10
minutes, from which suitable statistical
parameters can then be derived.
The choice of the input data format depends
also on the desired outcome of the estimation
system. If the outcome is not supposed to be a
high resolution time series statistical
parameters are probably sufficient in most
cases as input.
Data Verification
This step serves two main purposes. In the first
place, the input data has to be checked
continuously for plausibility. Single outliers of
input parameters as well as sensor
malfunctions have to be detected in order to
avoid corruption of the estimation results.
Secondly, some estimation procedures can only
handle data within a specific range, especially
when the estimation is based on empirically
derived relations which are not capable of
extrapolation of data beyond the calibration
range.
If corrupted or unusable data has been found a
suitable method of correction and handling of
these data has to be defined to make sure that
no periods of time are neglected for the fatigue
load estimation.
Transfer function
The transfer function is the key part of the
estimation. Some possible methods like
regression models and neural networks are
described and compared in the next section.
Monitoring
Load Monitoring
The individual short-term fatigue load
estimations would usually be cumulated to give
the overall long-term fatigue load. Cumulated
loads are then simply compared against the
design loads of the turbine and allow for an
assessment of the past operation of the turbine.
With some additional assumptions regarding
the long-term environmental conditions at a site
it is also possible to extrapolate the fatigue
loads to the design life of the wind turbine.
However, this method requires choosing
representative loads as basis for the
extrapolation and is therefore more complicated
than the simple load accumulation described
above.
If done correctly the life-time extrapolation
allows for a better assessment of the turbine
operation compared to the load accumulation
especially at the beginning of the monitoring
period. It can be expected that the results from
both methods approach each other after some
time of monitoring, e.g. two to three years.
Condition Monitoring
Without much additional effort the above load
estimation system can be extended to
incorporate a basic monitoring that aims for the
prediction of the overall turbine condition.
Besides information from a periodically
performed system identification also the result
of the data verification can be analysed to
safeguard the compliance of the wind turbine
with the specification and hence the design
assumptions of the wind turbine. Furthermore,
the predicted loads can be analysed with
respect to trends to detect wear and tear of the
turbine as well as long-term degradation.
3 Load Estimation Procedures
Four different load estimation procedures have
been analysed and compared to asses their
suitability for the proposed prediction scheme.
These are classical regression methods, neural
networks, physical model based approaches
and state estimators.
Classical regression techniques are often used
to establish relations between two sets of data,
in case that only limited information on the
underlying processes is available [1].
Regression usually requires making some
assumptions regarding the nature of the
connection between input and target values, for
example such as being linear. Furthermore, in a
preceding step suitable input parameters have
to be defined which will be related to the
targets. Based on these a priori choices the
input and target values are correlated to each
other and the parameters of the assumed
relation are derived. This relation is also
referred to as the regression function and can
be interpreted as transfer function which maps
the input to the target values.
If the relation between input and target values is
very non-linear or depends on several input
parameters the regression approach gets
significantly more complex. It is likely that many
correlations have to be tested and combined to
a working regression model in this case. The
process can be partly automated by means of
more elaborate stepwise regression techniques
[2] but still it can not be guaranteed that the
found solution performs well. Another serious
disadvantage of regression techniques is that
they can generally not be used for
extrapolation.
Neural networks have been proven to be a very
useful alternative to classic regressions [3]. As
shown in Figure 3 a single neuron consists of
the weighted summation of inputs and a pre-
defined function, the so called activation
function, which is used to derive the output of
the neuron. Many neurons can be combined in
parallel or in line to build a neural network. The
output of each activation function thereby
serves as input to the following neurons. If the
network is sufficiently large it is possible to
approximate very complex relations by a
combination of in fact relatively simple
activation functions.
One of the advantages of a neural network
approach is that these networks can be trained
to map the relation of input and output data if a
suitable amount of training data is available.
Using one of the many available training
algorithms, the set-up of a neural network is
often faster and easier than the set-up of a
regression model, especially if complex non-
linear relations have to be mapped.
Furthermore, assumptions regarding the nature
of the relation are required only in that respect
that the network has to be sufficiently large to
be able to approximate the relation with the
available number of neurons. An a priori
selection of suitable input parameters can
improve the training process but is not
compulsory. Input data which can not be related
to the output will simply be assigned a relatively
low weight during the training process.
Just as with regression techniques, application
of the neural network for predictions is only
reliable if the input data are within the range
which has been used for the training of the
network.
Detailed physical models, for example FE-or
multi body models of structures, can also be
used to relate input data to load quantities using
observer based approaches as known from
control theory. These models require very
specific input data, like accelerations or
deflections at specific points of the structure.
Furthermore, detailed knowledge of structural
properties of the physical system that governs
the relation has to be available. Alternatively,
classical grey-box system identification
approaches can be applied to set-up suitable
models [4]. Extrapolation, which is not possible
with regression or neural network techniques, is
not an issue with this approach. If the model
reflects the real system behaviour correctly it
can be applied at all turbine states.
State estimation can be applied to classify wind
turbine operation in terms of fatigue loads. For
each identified state a corresponding load is
read from an associated database and
cumulated to an overall fatigue load. The state
recognition approach requires an a priori
classification of turbine operation into suitable
 Figure 3: Single neuron and neural network
sub-states and the definition of representative
loads for each sub-state. Once this has been
achieved, the method is able to give results
even for turbine states that are difficult to
assess with other methods for example
transient situations like starts or stops.
Table 1 summarises the comparison of the
above described estimation methods. In most
cases, analysis of standard signals will probably
not give such detailed input to employ physical
models for the load prediction. Furthermore,
information for setting up these models might
not be fully available.
Wind turbines operate under constantly
changing wind conditions and the turbines
themselves are very non-linear systems.
Therefore, an excessive number of possible
states and the respective representative loads
would have to be defined, for state estimation
methods.
Because the presented work aims for an
approach with a broad applicability and which
requires as little information as possible on the
wind turbine itself, regression techniques and
neural networks both seem to be suitable. It is
very likely that the transfer function which
relates input and target values is highly non-
linear and depends on several input
parameters. This makes the use of classical
regression techniques difficult and therefore a
neural network based approach has been
chosen for this work. The estimation scheme
including input and target values is presented in
more detail in the next section.
4 Description of the Applied
Estimation Scheme
4.1 Overview
Fatigue loads can be described in various
formats such as time series, multi stage fatigue
spectra or single stage spectra, which can all
serve as targets for an estimation procedure.
The estimation of some of these formats has
been investigated in previous publications, for
example the estimation of high resolution rotor
thrust time series with regression models [2] or
the estimation of multi stage rainflow spectra
with neural networks [5, 6].
Here we focus on the prediction of single stage
spectra based on standard signals and neural
networks (Figure 4). The prediction of single
stage spectra has already been discussed
briefly in [5], but only with respect to the rotor
torque. In this work we extend this approach
also to other main load components.
Because standard signals are usually
measured in a fixed frame of reference behind
the rotor they can be regarded as integral
quantities and include cumulated aerodynamic
and structural dynamic effects from all three
blades. Here, special focus will be placed on
the suitability of these integral quantities for the
estimation of non-integral loads, such as blade
root bending moments.
Two main tasks have been performed for the
set-up of the estimation procedure:
1. Calculation of statistical parameters and
single stage loads
Because the spectra are estimated for fixed
time periods of ten minutes we also use
only statistical parameters of the standard
signals as input to the estimation
procedure. Suitable statistical parameters
are derived from standard signals. They
serve then as input to the neural network
for the prediction of single stage fatigue
load spectra.
2. Training of the neural network
Prior to the estimation the network has to
be trained to map the relations between the
input data and the single stage spectra.
Common feed-forward networks with only
one hidden layer have been used in this
work. Training of the network was
performed on basis of standard training
algorithms such as backpropagation with
moment term or resilient backpropagation
[3].
 Figure 4: Scheme for the estimation of single stage spectra from standard signals using neural
networks

Estimation
Data Requirements Assumptions Coverage Miscellaneous
Method
- Input and target - A priori choice of - Extrapolation not - Standard
values have to be the most relevant possible; only technique for
available input parameters valid for the linear problems
required design ranges - Effort increases
- Assumptions significantly for
Regression
regarding the non-linear
Techniques
nature of the multivariate
regression problems
function - Regression
function available
as equation
- Many data sets of - Network - Extrapolation not - Suitable for non-
input and target architecture and possible; only linear multivariate
values for training training valid for the problems
required algorithms have design ranges - Relevant input
to be chosen parameters are
found
automatically
Neural networks during the training
process
- Relation of input
and target values
‘hidden’ in
network, i.e. not
directly
accessible
- Detailed - Model and input - Coverage of all - Most suitable for
information for the data are operational states specific
set up and sufficiently component
validation of a complex and models, e.g.
Physical models
physical model accurate to allow support structures
necessary for predictions or actuators
- Suitable input
data for the model
- Input and target - Suitable sub- - Depends on the - Accuracy of the
values are states of the defined states results increases
required operational only with the number
- Information on the conditions can be of defined states
State estimation turbine load defined - Capable of load
with database characteristics - Representative estimations
and operational loads for each during transients
behaviour sub-state can be
necessary derived

Table 1: Comparison of estimation methods

 Figure 5: Variation of skewness and kurtosis
Suitable statistical parameters and the
derivation of single stage fatigue loads are
discussed in the following sections.
4.2 Relevant Statistical Parameters
Most variable-speed pitch-controlled wind
turbines monitor at least electrical power output,
generator rotational speed, pitch angles and
tower top accelerations. Furthermore wind
direction deviations and yaw activities are
recorded. Secondary signals like rotational
accelerations or pitch rates can be derived from
these primary data if necessary.
In a pre-processing step adequate statistical
parameters have to be calculated. These
parameters have to be suitable to describe the
turbine activities during the past time period. If
the chosen parameters do not reflect the
turbine behaviour well or if relevant information
has been omitted the accuracy of the estimation
result is likely to be decreased. Often a good
description of the corresponding turbine
operation is only possible if time and frequency
domain related parameters are included.
Time domain related parameters
The mean values of standard signals can
indicate the average operation point of a turbine
while standard deviations or variances are
basic measures of the variability of the
operation around this point.
A more detailed description of the variability is
possible if additional higher order statistical
parameters like the skewness and the kurtosis
are taken into account. These parameters are
calculated from the third and fourth central
moments of a signal and can be used to
describe basic deviations of the signal
distribution from the normal distribution [1]. As
illustrated in Figure 5, the skewness indicates
the deviation of the distribution peak from the
mean of the distribution, while the kurtosis is
related to the relative flatness of the distribution.
Frequency domain related parameters
Besides knowing the variability of a signal, the
frequency content of the oscillations is also
valuable information and can improve the
estimation results. Similar to the central
moments in the time domain, the spectral
moments are basic parameters to characterise
the distribution of the signal’s oscillations in the
frequency domain.
To derive the spectral moments, time series are
usually transferred to the frequency domain to
yield the power spectra density (PSD) of a
signal as shown in Figure 6. Often traditional
Fast Fourier Transform based spectral
estimation methods, for example the
periodogram or the correlation method, are
applied for this task.
Other approaches utilise autoregression
models, where the autoregression coefficients
are derived from the autocorrelation function of
a signal. The coefficients can then be related to
the power spectra density. These models are
computationally more expensive but can give
better results than the traditional approaches,
especially if relatively short sequences of a
signal are to be analysed. Furthermore they do
not rely on the assumption, that the signal is
composed of harmonically related sinusoids.
[7]. If the PSD has been derived, the spectral
moments can be calculated with cyclic
frequency f and the order n of the spectral
moment from
∞
λn = ∫ f n ⋅ PSD( f ) df
0
It should be mentioned that there are also
methods to derive spectral moments directly
from time domain representations of a process
[8, 9]. However, from the above formula it is
obvious, that the contribution of high
frequencies to the spectral moment increases
with increasing order of the moment. A
comparison of moments of different order can
therefore be used to conclude on the
 Figure 6: Normalised generator rotational speed signal as time series and power spectral
characteristics of the PSD and hence on the
distribution of energy of the process.
Time series which feature significant
oscillations with periods that are relatively large
compared to the length of the time series are
often denoted as being trended. Trends in wind
speeds make the comparison of measured wind
turbine data more complicated, because they
can have for example a large influence on the
variance of some signals while others are left
almost unaffected. Therefore trended data sets
are often excluded when measured data is
analysed.
In case of a load estimation system, excluding
data sets is not an option. Instead the
introduction of trend related parameters is
preferred. Besides utilising spectral moments, it
is also possible to compare for example the
total variance of the signal to the variance of the
same but low-pass filtered signal.
4.3 Output Data
Multi stage load spectra are determined from
time series by appropriate counting procedures.
An example is the rainflow counting procedure,
which is used to count load cycles in a time
series. The rainflow multi stage spectrum can
be further simplified to a single stage spectrum,
which under certain assumptions will give the
same fatigue damage. It can be calculated from
the number of cycles Ni associated with the
load range Si, a reference load cycle number
Nref and an exponent m. The exponent m is
usually chosen as inverse slope of the S-N
curve and thereby reflects material properties
with respect to fatigue.
∑ (∆S i
m
⋅ Ni
∆S eq, N ref , m, k = m i
N ref
From the above formula it is also obvious, that if
the single stage spectrum is calculated with a
large exponent, large load ranges will have a
relatively higher impact on the result compared
to calculations with small values of m.
Therefore a comparison of single stage spectra
which have been derived from different
exponents can indicate the ratio of large to
small load ranges in the underlying multi stage
spectra.
Besides the rainflow spectra, multi stage load
duration distributions are often used to
characterise the loading of a wind turbine.
These distributions are a measure of how long
certain load levels are present. Similar to the
above definition a single stage distribution can
be calculated from the time Ti, the
corresponding load level Li and a reference
time Tref. The exponent p can be used again to
indicate the ratio of large and small load levels
in the distribution.
∑ (L )
p
i ⋅ Ti
Leq ,Tref , p , k = p i
Tref
The target values of the load estimation
procedure are single stage spectra and
distributions on the basis of ten minute time
periods. They can be assembled to a single
value if the same reference numbers and
exponents have been used.
( )
∆S eq , N ref , m = m ∑ ∆S eq , N ref , m , k
m
k
∑ (L )
Leq ,Tref , p =
p
p eq ,Tref , p , k
k
) 5 Test and Validation
5.1 General
The above described approach for the
estimation of single stage spectra and
distributions from statistical parameters of
standard signals has been developed and
tested on the basis of simulated wind turbine
data first. In a second step, the method is
validated with measured data from real wind
turbines. Only results on the basis of measured
data are given in this section.
Since 2005 the Endowed Chair of Wind Energy
is involved in a long-term measurement
campaign that is still going on at the prototype
of the Multibrid M5000 turbine in Bremerhaven.
The M5000 is a state of the art multi-megawatt
turbine with a rated power output of 5 MW, a
rotor diameter of 116 m and a hub height of
102m.
For the validation of the presented approach,
about 150h of measured data have been
extracted reflecting typical site conditions with
wind speeds between 4 and 22m/s and
turbulence intensities ranging from 3 to 17%.
Only measured time series where the turbine
was in normal power production mode are
considered.
Time and frequency domain related statistical
parameters of electrical power, generator
rotational speed, generator rotational
acceleration, pitch angle and tower top
accelerations have been calculated. Single
stage loads of rotor torque, rotor thrust and
blade root bending moments have been
analysed using two exponents (4 and 10) for
each load quantity. The blade root bending
moments are estimated as in-plane and out-of-
plane moments in a fixed coordinate system as
well as edge- and flapwise moments in a
pitching coordinate system.
For each load quantity and each exponent a
single neural network has been trained. About
120h of data have been used to train the
networks. The trained neural networks have
then been utilised to predict the single stage
spectra on basis of the derived statistical
parameters. This has been done for the
remaining 30h of data, which have not been
included in the training process.
The estimation results of single stage spectra
∆Seq,Nref,m are given in the next section for two
exponents, followed by the results for the single
stage distributions ∆Leq,Tref,p. In both cases, the
estimations have been compared with results
from standard time series counting procedures
and the errors have been computed.
5.2 Estimation of Single Stage
Spectra
For each load the following quantities have
been computed, in order to assess the
accuracy of the estimation results:
• the overall error calculated from the
logarithmic sum of all estimations
∆Seq,Nref,m
• the linear average of all estimation
errors ∆Seq,Nref,m,k
• the standard deviation of all estimation
errors as measure of the average error
of a single estimation
Exact values are listed in Table 2, while Figure
7 illustrates the data further.
The mean error is relatively small for all
estimations and decreases even further if the
individual estimations are cumulated to an
overall long-term spectrum. In this case the
maximum deviation is about 4% only in the
case of the out-of-plane blade root bending
moment and an exponent of m=10. These
accurate results seem at least to some extend
to be due to the averaging of prediction results.
The standard deviation of errors indicates that
larger differences between predicted and real
loads can be expected for a single estimation.
Especially for large exponents an error of 10 to
13% is likely.
The most accurate predictions have been
derived for the in-plane and edgewise blade
root bending moments respectively. These
quantities are dominated by deterministic
oscillations which are due to the self weight of
the blade and the rotation of the rotor. As the
weight is constant and the rotational speed is a
direct input to the procedure a very good result
can be expected. This holds true even for the
standard deviations of the estimation error
which are also higher for all other loads. The
somewhat lower standard deviation for spectra
calculated on the basis of the exponent of 4
indicates that these quantities can be predicted
better compared to the spectra based on larger
exponents.
In general, the estimations of out-of-plane and
flapwise bending moments comprise the largest
errors. This is probably due to the fact, that all
input signals are measured in a fixed frame of
reference behind the rotor. They can therefore
be regarded as integral quantities and include
cumulated aerodynamic and structural dynamic
effects from all three blades. Utilisation of these
signals for the prediction of aerodynamically
driven blade root loads results hence in
relatively large scatter of the estimation results.
 Figure 7: Comparison of single stage spectra estimation errors

Figure 8: Comparison of single stage distribution estimation errors

5.3 Estimation of Single Stage

Distributions 6 Conclusion and Outlook
A method for the estimation of single stage
The same estimation errors as described above
fatigue loads from standard wind turbine signals
have also been derived for the single stage
has been developed. As the exact relationships
distributions. Results are given in Table 3 and
between standard wind turbine signals and load
Figure 8.
quantities are in general unknown, an empirical
approach has been applied. Here, statistical
In general, the single stage distributions can be
parameters of the standard signals are related
predicted with higher accuracy compared to the
to the main load components by trained neural
spectra. The estimation errors for the
networks. The focus is placed on the estimation
cumulated distributions are between -1.3 and
of the most important load components, such
0.5% in any case.
as blade root bending moment, rotor thrust,
Unlike to the spectra, the largest standard
rotor torque and tower bending moments, which
deviations of the estimation errors occur for
are characteristic for the overall turbine load
integral load quantities, i.e. the rotor torque and
level.
the rotor thrust. The most likely reason for this
Measured data from a state-of-the-art multi
is the relatively large variation in the 10 minute
megawatt wind turbine has been used for the
mean value of these loads compared to the
validation of the approach. Results show
variations in the other quantities.
relatively small estimation errors only,
especially if they are cumulated to an overall
long-term load.
 Mean error from Standard deviation of
Error from ∆Seq,Nref,m
∆Seq,Nref,m,k error from ∆Seq,Nref,m,k
Load quantity
% % %
m=4 m = 10 m=4 m = 10 m=4 m = 10
Rotor torque 0.5 -1.2 1.1 2.3 6.7 13.2
Rotor thrust 1.8 0.6 3.7 2.8 7.9 9.9
In-plane bending moment 0.0 1.1 0.1 1.3 1.6 1.8
Out-of-plane bending moment 2.7 4.0 5.4 6.4 10.9 11.7
Edgewise bending moment 0.7 0.0 0.8 0.3 1.7 1.6
Flapwise bending moment 2.0 2.1 3.8 8.0 11.2 12.2
Table 2: Single stage spectra estimation errors

Mean error from Standard deviation of

Error from Leq,Tref,p
Leq,Tref,p,k error from Leq,Tref,p,k
Load quantity
% % %
p=4 p = 10 p=4 p = 10 p=4 p = 10
Rotor torque -0.1 -0.3 0.8 -0.1 7.5 2.6
Rotor thrust -0.4 -1.3 1.4 0.2 5.7 4.8
In-plane bending moment 0.4 0.5 0.4 0.6 1.4 1.8
Out-of-plane bending moment 0.0 0.4 -0.1 0.5 2.1 2.1
Edgewise bending moment -0.1 0.2 0.0 0.5 1.6 1.9
Flapwise bending moment 0.0 0.6 -0.1 1.0 2.3 2.1
Table 3: Single stage distribution estimation errors

Further validation of the method with data from
onshore wind turbines is planned. Emphasis will
be placed on the robustness of the method and
also on transferability of the established
estimation procedure to other turbines of the
same type. Application and improvement of the
approach with data from the German offshore
test site “alpha ventus” will begin as soon as
measured data is available.
Acknowledgements
The research is part of the Project ”Verification
of Offshore Wind Turbines” (OWEA) at the
German offshore test site ”alpha ventus” and is
supported by the Federal Ministry for
Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear
Safety (BMU). The authors further acknowledge
the cooperation with the Multibrid GmbH,
Bremerhaven, and the possibility to validate the
presented approach on the basis of measured
data.
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