Design of warranty extension model for wind turbine blades

Mature industries like Automotive, Electronics and Industrial equipment already have proven concepts of extended warranty offerings. However, Energy/Renewables being a maturing industry, warranty extension offering is still in its nascent stages. As the industry is becoming more and more competitive, it is expected that extended warranty may become a norm to protect customers' high capital investments. This paper explores application of various life data analysis techniques to calculate warranty extension risk at a granular level like for a particular failure mode or a specific customer based on historical trends. By doing this, the management is being provided with some fair understanding of the risk that arises out of extended warranty.

1 Introduction

To remain competitive and part away with external support, the demand for low cost of energy is on rise in the wind energy domain. This necessarily translates into an agreement of risk sharing between the operators, OEM's and suppliers. One such risk sharing is addressed by the long crying demand of warranty extension, to remain competitive in business and to protect the capital equipment. The warranty extension ensures Return-on-Investment is quicker and hassle-free by not having to spend on further repairs for operators during the extended length of warranty. At the same time it puts additional pressure on manufacturers to take responsibility for the extended time and deliver more reliable products thereby being able to provide warranty extension and remain competitive in the market. With the test data and limited available field data till current warranty period, it is a challenge for the manufacturers to proactively estimate the risk of providing extended warranty.