GarrettCom Industrial Ethernet Switches in Wind Farm Networks

Ethernet switches, routers and serial converters enable reliable monitoring and control of wind farms, and help reduce maintenance costs

With much of the emphasis for the world’s renewable energy targets falling on wind power, maximising the yield from the wind has become a prime focus. Getting the most out of wind – a somewhat unpredictable source of energy – is dependent upon effective monitoring and control, combined with the ability to reduce downtime and maintenance costs to a minimum.

Reliable networking of the various discrete devices employed within each wind turbine, and of the various turbines themselves back to a centralised control system is essential. With the goal of achieving a common communications architecture and interoperability between the various sensing and control devices employed, wind farm operators are increasingly standardising on Ethernet for the networking architecture.

With windfarms typically covering very wide areas, Ethernet offers the ideal networking technology to provide a communication link between the turbines and the control facility, and within the turbines themselves. Ethernet provides wide support for a host of sensing and control devices, the lowest cost base for network infrastructure, and ease of upgradeability as control and monitoring requirements evolve.

Within a typical turbine there will be sensors to monitor wind speed, wind direction and shaft rotation, and motors and sensors to control and monitor parameters such as pitch and yaw, all under the local control of a PLC or industrial PC. At the same time, all the data is also fed back to a central monitoring and control station, using SCADA to monitor, analyse and act upon the information received, and to respond to any alarms generated.

Building an effective Ethernet network to enable the required level of control depends upon reliable infrastructure devices. These devices must operate in some of the most challenging environmental conditions, subjected to constant vibration, high levels of EMI, extremes of temperature, condensation, humidity and corrosion.

GarrettCom Europe has a complete range of managed and unmanaged Ethernet switches, along with routers and serial converters meeting the specific requirements of operation in wind farms, complete with a full suite of management software. Testament to the capability of the products in these most challenging of applications is their specification on the London Array – the world’s largest consented offshore wind farm with the potential to one day power up to 750,000 homes.

GarrettCom Europe’s Ethernet switches provide best-in-class performance and features, meeting the increasing demands for bandwidth, precision and hardening in the most challenging applications. Compliant with IEC 61850, the products have passed MIL-Standard shock and vibration testing, and offer extended temperature operation from -40 to +85°C. They offer absolute EMI/RFI interference rejection and protection as standard, and can be conformally coated for protection against high humidity, corrosive chemical and salt spray. Rugged, robust and available as sealed units that don’t need internal cooling fans; these highly reliable products offer dependable operation with MTBF of over 125,000 hours at extended temperatures.

The product range covers everything from high port count, rack mounted switches to cost-effective edge-of-network devices, offering options to accommodate user selection of combinations of 10Mb, 100Mb or Gigabit fibre media as well as RJ45 copper media. Power options include 125V DC, 110V DC, 48V DC and worldwide AC, with redundant power options and hot swap power supply facilities ensuring ultimate reliability. The range also includes industrial serial routers, which combine the features of a serial device server, Ethernet switch and IP router in a single product. In addition, GarrettCom Europe offers industrially hardened link converters to convert serial copper to fibre, and next generation Ethernet Terminal Servers that provide new benchmark standards for configurability, reliability and functionality.

Network reliability is assured through GarrettCom’s implementation of RSTP offering the market’s fastest network recovery times, and through its own standards-based S-Ring Redundancy Manager software, enabling the company’s switches to simplify and speed up recover from faults in industrial Ethernet LAN configurations that use a ring structure. With S-Ring, fault tolerant LANs finally can have both standards and speed.

About GarrettCom
GarrettCom is a world leader in the manufacturing of industrial Ethernet products, offering a comprehensive line of switches, routers, converters and terminal servers for use in industrial and automated environments. GarrettCom Software applications, embedded in the company's MNS-6K Ethernet management software, support redundant rings and secure web-based access to local and remote networks. GarrettCom markets its products through a network of resellers, OEMs, system integrators, and distributors worldwide. For more information on GarrettCom and its products, visit www.garrettcom.co.uk