New editions of IEC 61400-2, RenewableUK, and MCS 006 small wind turbine standards

The IEC 61400-2 edition 3 small wind turbine standard is now available. Right now it is available as a prerelease (FDIS) on the IEC webstore (see here ) . If you purchase and download it they will send you the formal publication in due course, as an IS. This is expected in December 2013 or January 2014. Because it is available for purchase from IEC it can now be used by Certification Bodies. This brings to an end a 5-year effort by the members of the MT2 committee that wrote this 3rd edition - thanks everyone.

Following on from this RenewableUK have issued an update to the RenewableUK small wind turbine standard, dated 1 October 2013. This replaces the older BWEA small wind standard (in the last few years BWEA has done a name change to RUK) and because a lot of the content has been sucked into the IEC standard the RUK one has reduced from 20 pages to 5 pages. See here or here. Thanks to everyone in the RUK smallwind tech cte who worked on this.

Following on from this MCS have issued an update to the MCS 006 small wind turbine product standard, as revision 2.0. See here. Again thanks to everyone in the MCS small wind working group WG3a who worked on this.

The main changes in the IEC standard are:

• the title has been modified to better reflect the scope;
• restructured into part I (design evaluation) and part II (type testing) to harmonise use with IEC 61400-22 conformity testing and certification;
• caution provided regarding the use of simplified equations;
• added annex on other wind conditions;
• added annex on tropical storms;
• added annex on extreme environmental conditions;
• added annex on EMC testing;
• added annex on dynamic behaviour;
• duration testing requirements modified;
• added annex on standardised format consumer label;
• many minor changes and all known errata corrected.

The main changes in the RUK standard are:

• Errata will be fixed in a Jan 2014 release
• Foundation documents
• IEC 61400-2 ed 3
• Compliance with all sections of IEC 61400-2
• Except Section 9 (electrical) not required
• And Annex A (variants) made normative (i.e. mandatory)
• And Annex M (consumer label) made normative (i.e. mandatory)
• Note emphasised by repetition in RUK
• In accordance with Section 1 of IEC 61400-2 ed3, “Any of the requirements of this standard may be altered if it can be suitably demonstrated that the safety of the turbine system is not compromised”.
• Ongoing obligations
• During and after turbine certification the manufacturer is required to notify the accredited certifying body of all significant changes to the product, including hardware and software. The accredited certifying body will determine whether there is a need for retesting and/or additional review.
• This requirement to notify the certifying body is intended to be interpreted broadly and in a co-operative manner by both manufacturer and certification body such that any relevant information regarding the in-service performance of the wind turbine system and any of its variants is analysed and the design, manufacture, installation, operation, or maintenance varied accordingly in accordance with the underlying purpose of this standard. This requirement includes significant incidents or failures of which the manufacturer is aware.
• This requirement is to be fulfilled in a timely manner and to include all credible sources of information. Procedures can be agreed between the certification body and the manufacturer such that information is managed in a proportionate manner.

The main changes in the MCS standard are:

• Errata will be fixed in a Jan 2014 release

• Foundation documents
• IEC 61400-2 ed 3 and RUK 2013
• Sunset & sunrise clause
• Available for use from 1 Oct 2013
• New products must use from 1 October 2016 (sunrise)
• Old products must use from 1 October 2018 (sunset)
• Scope
• This scheme provides ongoing independent, third party assessment and approval of companies who wish to demonstrate that their small wind turbines with rated electrical power outputs up to 50 kW (measured at a wind speed of 11.0 m/s) and:
• with a rotor swept area smaller than or equal to 200m2 meet and continue to meet the requirements of the RenewableUK Small Wind Turbine Standard (01 October 2013); or,
• meet and continue to meet the requirements of the most recent edition of IEC 61400-1 Wind Turbines – Design Requirements and selected requirements of the RenewableUK Small Wind Turbine Standard (01 October 2013).
• Maintenance of certification
• Certificates and listing are maintained and held in force subject to satisfactory completion of the following requirements for maintenance of certification:
• 8.2.4 certification is otherwise maintained as described in section 8 of the RenewableUK Small Wind Turbine Standard (01 October 2013)
• Applicable from 1 January 2014

It is hoped and expected that these will be adopted in whole or part in other areas of the world (e.g. by AWEA for USA, Riso DTU for Denmark, and ClassNK for Japan). 

IEC 61400-2 edition 3: small wind turbines (CDV) votes & comments

IEC 61400-2 edition 3 progress:

The vote on the CDV (committee draft for vote) for IEC 61400-2 edition 3 has now been received by the IEC secretariat. Twenty countries voted yes, with one no vote that asked for a few changes. There were about 60 comments and the MT2 international committee will now work through them. The aim is to get the FDIS (final draft) circulated within a couple of months, and then the actual international standard (IS) issued in the Summer of 2013 as edition 3.

RUK smallwind standard, and MCS-006 smallwind standard:

This IEC milestone has led to a series of related updates of the RUK smallwind standard (RenewableUK, previously known as the BWEA, British Wind Energy Association) and the MCS-006 smallwind product standard moving forwards. Drafts of both of these have been circulated to the members of IEC MT2 committee and IEA task 27 working group which includes representatives of the smallwind industry from almost all countries. The next step for both the MCS and RUK drafts is that they will go through a public consultation phase in accordance with both organisations' administrative norms. The aim will be to complete the consultation phase shortly after the FDIS is published, as the release of the FDIS is the first occasion when the IEC commences public sale of a new standard.

http://webstore.iec.ch/Webstore/webstore.nsf/0/A5C565FFDF4A4045C12575570057BDA8?OpenDocument

In the meantime if you wish to read a copy of the CDV please contact your country's smallwind association(s) and/or your country's National Committee that links to the IEC.
 

RUK technical note: guidance regarding inverter changes


The RUK smallwind technical committee has released a second edition of the inverter change guidance note, and it has been recognised by MCS as an informative document. A copy can be found on the RUK website, or more easily on the MCS website:

http://www.microgenerationcertification.org/mcs-standards/product-standards


MCS guidance note: potentially novel wind turbine designs:


The Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) has released a guidance note regarding the pathway to certification of potentially novel wind turbine designs. It can be found on their website,

http://www.microgenerationcertification.org/mcs-standards/product-standards


in it are some very pertinent points that the MCS wind working group (WG3) have written to assist people trying to do something they think is new. I won't repeat the points but I will say that certification and standards decisions are a fundamental part of a designer's early-stage work, and are as important as any other part of the technical work, and that any designer should read these documents before they even start to sketch a design.