Patent ID: 9605654
Date: 2017-03-28
CPC Classifications: F03D,F05B,Y02E

Claim:
1. A method of operating at least one wind turbine, comprising: determining, via one or more sensors, a plurality of stress events of at least one component of the at least one wind turbine; calculating, via a computer-implemented rainflow counting algorithm programmed in a controller, at least one accumulated stress from at least two of the plurality of stress events; determining, via the controller, a ratio of the at least one accumulated stress to a predicted stress of the at least one component; determining, via another computer-implemented rainflow counting algorithm programmed in the controller, at least one residual lifetime based at least partially on the ratio; and adjusting at least one operational setting of the at least one wind turbine based on the at least one residual lifetime, the operational setting comprising at least one of a power level, a pitch angle, a yaw angle, or a generator speed of the wind turbine.