Probabilistic Fatigue Design of Composite Material for Wind Turbine Blades

In the present paper a probabilistic design approach to fatigue design of wind turbine blades is presented. The physical uncertainty on the fatigue strength for composite material is estimated using public available fatigue tests. Further, the model uncertainty on Miner rule for damage accumulation is also estimated based on test results. The results show that Miners rule gives a non-conservative estimate on the accumulated damage at failure. The reliability of a wind turbine blade is estimated for both out-of-plane and in-plane loading using three different design standards. The estimated annual reliability index is in general slightly higher than the target reliability implicitly used in IEC 61400–1. However, the reliability varies significantly between different load cases if a simple constant life diagram is used for representing the fatigue strength.In the present paper a probabilistic design approach to fatigue design of wind turbine blades is presented. The physical uncertainty on the fatigue strength for composite material is estimated using public available fatigue tests. Further, the model uncertainty on Miner rule for damage accumulation is also estimated based on test results. The results show that Miners rule gives a non-conservative estimate on the accumulated damage at failure. The reliability of a wind turbine blade is estimated for both out-of-plane and in-plane loading using three different design standards. The estimated annual reliability index is in general slightly higher than the target reliability implicitly used in IEC 61400–1. However, the reliability varies significantly between different load cases if a simple constant life diagram is used for representing the fatigue strength