Wind-sourced energy today is an option of strategic interest given the quantity of energy available to cover demand in the long term, basically thanks to its geographical scope and to the fact that it is an environmentally sustainable option. In this context, the development of technologies for the transformation of wind-sourced energy is presently at a stage of expansion. This expansion is also making its mark in the field of mini wind turbines, a field in which the recently approved 2011-2020 Plan for Renewable Energy puts forward specific objectives.
Adaptation to cover the demand of a strategic sector
With this remit, Fibrotec Materiales Compuestos S.L., a technology-based company in Valencia and specialised in the design of, calculations for and building of structures using pultrusion- manufactured sections aimed at the construction sector, has identified a new business activity in order to extend its main markets. This giant step is embodied in a R+D+i project in collaboration with URJATO SLP – a company dedicated to aeronautic engineering and architecture – as well as the GAIKER-IK4 Technological Centre. The objective of the project is to employ pultrusion technology for the manufacture of products in the wind-sourced energy sector.
Within the framework of this R+D+i project it is seen that this technology meets the key requirements for the manufacture of sections for constant-speed mini wind generator blades. Pultrusion, in fact, enables advanced, alternative and mass methods of manufacture that incorporate important improvements in the speed and price of manufacture and, moreover, enables enhancing the repetitivity, uniformity and quality of the product. FIBROTEC S.L., thus opening a new field of application for pultrusion that enables the minigenerator to be incorporated into new environments for the generation and auto-consumption of electricity - urban, residential, agricultural/animal husbandry, as well as industrial estates and petrol stations.
Moreover, within the framework of this research, GAIKER-IK4 has looked into the possibility of developing products mouldable by transformation techniques, which are competitive with and complementary to the compression and vacuum moulding for pre-impregnated structures, in a constant quest for new ideas that incorporate innovation into the product as a fundamental basis for developing new, high-impact designs in the mini wind turbines sector.