The invention relates to the real-time determination of the forces applied by waves incident upon the moving part (2) of a wave-energy system (1). The method according to the invention is based on the construction of a model of the radiation force applied to the moving part (2) and a model of the dynamics of the wave-energy system (1). The invention uses only measurements of the kinematics of the moving part (2) and the force applied by the conversion machine (3) to the moving part (2).

An apparatus for detecting anomalies in an acoustic signal, the apparatus including: one or more microphones for receiving an acoustic signal of an environment; and a processor implementing: an acoustic signal processing module configured to: analyse the acoustic signal to identify anomalies in the acoustic signal indicative of events occurring in the environment; and classify the anomalies in the acoustic signal into one or more event classifications; and a communications module configured to output the one or more event classifications, wherein the apparatus is located in the environment and includes an environmental enclosure arranged to house the processor and to protect the processor from environmental contaminants.

Monitoring and assessing power performance changes of one or more wind turbines of a wind farm. For each wind turbine to be monitored, a group of reference wind turbines is defined. During a training period a transfer function is generated for each monitored wind turbine. The transfer function establishes a relationship between locally measured wind speeds at each of the reference wind turbines and the power performance data for the monitored wind turbine obtained during the training period. During one or more subsequent test periods, measured power performance data for the monitored wind turbines is compared to predicted power performance data. The predicted power performance data is obtained by means of the locally measured wind speeds at the corresponding reference wind turbines during the test period(s) and the previously generated transfer function for the monitored wind turbine. This allows even small and/or gradual power performance degradation to be detected.

A wind turbine is disclosed which comprises a control system configured to execute at least one ice removal routine which comprises a heating stage of at least one of the blades (3), and a mechanical removal ice stage. A wind turbine removing ice method is also disclosed which comprises a stage wherein the presence of ice is detected on at least one of the blades and, once said presence of ice is detected, comprises a stage wherein at least one ice removal routine is activated which comprises, in turn, a heating stage of at least one of the blades and a mechanical removing ice stage on at least said blade.

A method for detecting when a rotor blade of a wind turbine is stuck is described. The method can include monitoring, via a controller, a speed of rotation of the wind turbine, and, determining, via the controller, a running average of the speed of rotation. The method further includes applying, via the controller, at least one filtering operation to the running average to obtain a filtered value, and, determining, via the controller, a stuck condition of one or more rotor blades of the wind turbine based on the filtered value. The method can also include performing a control operation to reduce loading on the wind turbine based on the stuck condition.

Provided is a method for controlling wind turbines of a wind park connected to a utility grid, in case of a drop of a grid frequency, the method including controlling each of the wind turbines individually by an individual wind turbine control signal indicating an individual additional wind turbine power to be output by the respective wind turbine, wherein the individual wind turbine control signal is based on: a desired additional wind park power to be supplied from the wind park to the utility grid and an operational characteristic of the respective wind turbine.

A method and apparatus for applying optimized yaw settings to wind turbines including receiving operating data from at least one wind turbine on a wind farm and sending the data to a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system on the at least one wind turbine to generate current SCADA data. The current SCADA data is sent a central processing center away from the wind farm. The central processing center includes an optimization system that can generate a new look up table (LUT) including at least one new wind turbine yaw setting calculated using information comprising wind direction, wind velocity, wind turbine location in the wind farm, information from a historic SCADA database, and yaw optimizing algorithms. The new LUT is then sent to a yaw setting selection engine (YSSE) where instructions regarding the use of the new LUT are generated.

Methods of measuring a stall condition of a rotor of a wind turbine are disclosed. In one aspect a stall parameter is obtained on the basis of the power parameter and a thrust parameter; and the stall parameter compared with a threshold to determine a stall condition of the rotor.

A method and apparatus for applying optimized yaw settings to wind turbines including receiving operating data from at least one wind turbine on a wind farm and sending the data to a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system on the at least one wind turbine to generate current SCADA data. The current SCADA data is sent a central processing center away from the wind farm. The central processing center includes an optimization system that can generate a new look up table (LUT) including at least one new wind turbine yaw setting calculated using information comprising wind direction, wind velocity, wind turbine location in the wind farm, information from a historic SCADA database, and yaw optimizing algorithms. The new LUT is then sent to a yaw setting selection engine (YSSE) where instructions regarding the use of the new LUT are generated.

The invention relates to the real-time determination of the forces applied by waves incident upon the moving part (2) of a wave-energy system (1). The method according to the invention is based on the construction of a model of the radiation force applied to the moving part (2) and a model of the dynamics of the wave-energy system (1). The invention uses only measurements of the kinematics of the moving part (2) and the force applied by the conversion machine (3) to the moving part (2).