150 - Wind Turbine Fires with Guillermo Rein
Fire Science Show
English - May 01, 2024 06:00 - 52 minutes - 35.8 MB - ★★★★★ - 15 ratingsPhysics Science Technology fire smoke wildfire cfd safety risk civil engineering Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Wind turbine fires - are they an issue, or are they not? In this episode, I am joined by Prof. Guillermo Rein of the Imperial College London, who raised this issue 10 years ago at the IAFSS conference, and I believe we still do not have a clear answer.
In this episode, we discuss the fire safety of wind turbines using the layers of protection framework - from suppression, detection, and prevention to firefighting. We have discussed the challenges with evacuation and the subsequent fires triggered by "firebrands" flying out of the burning wind turbine.
I try to show this discussion also as a great example case study for fire safety engineering. Having this sharp cost of the fire (loss of turbine, loss of income), pretty much binary outcomes of fires (if there is a fire the turbine is most likely lost) and a cost of safety features, we can truly put a number on how much monetary value the fire safety features of a wind turbine bring.
If you would like to learn more about wind turbine fires, I highly recommend the more recent article in SFPE Fire Protection Engineering magazine and the IAFSS paper on the topic (from 2013).
----
The Fire Science Show is produced by the Fire Science Media in collaboration with OFR Consultants. Thank you to the podcast sponsor for their continuous support towards our mission.