Fenner windmill collapse report due this month

FENNER — Enel North America expects to release the findings of an investigation into the collapse of Turbine 18 at the Fenner Wind Farm this month.

The 187-ton turbine off Buyea Road fell in the early morning hours of Dec. 27, causing the 20-turbine wind farm to systematically shut down.

Enel, General Electric and Mortenson Construction — the company that installed the foundation of the turbine — have been involved in the investigation of the collapse, Enel Spokesman Hank Sennott said.

“We’re being very cautious here for a lot of reasons,” Sennott said. “This is the first time, as far as we know, that a turbine has failed in this particular manner.”

Of the 260 Enel-owned turbines in the United State and Canada, Fenner’s is the only one to collapse, he said.

The towering 329-foot tall turbine did not break at any point along its structure, Sennott said, but instead came detached from the foundation.

“As far we know, that’s never happened before,” he said. “As a company, we’ve never experienced a turbine failure so this is something new to us.”

The collapse could have been a result of a defect in construction or simply a fluke, he said.

“We just don’t know at this point,” he said.

Since the failure of Turbine 18, the farm has been shut down, unable to produce energy.

“In the abundance of caution, we decided we should probably just look at them all,” Sennott said of the investigation.

Surrounding soil will be studied in the investigation to see if it has changed since the farm’s inception in 2001.

Borings of the foundation, concrete and support materials will also be examined by an outside lab, Sennott said.

“Just to be exceedingly cautious, we felt that until we knew what happened to Turbine 18, it wasn’t the appropriate thing to do, so we opted to wait,” Sennott said.

Since the collapse, the surrounding area around the base of each turbine has been fenced off. Sennott said this will be a temporary measure.

“We just want to be careful,” he said. “In general, people shouldn’t stop their cars and go stand under one anyway.”

The $34 million farm is covered by insurance and the fallen turbine has been projected to cost several million dollars to replace.

While the company searches for answers, Sennott said revenue is taking a hit from the loss of energy production.

The Fenner Wind Farm has been estimated to produce enough energy to provide electricity to 10,000 homes.

Sennott explained that Enel does not have a purchasing contract with any utility companies and instead sells its production on an as-needed basis.

“I praise them for what they’re doing,” Fenner Supervisor Russell Cary said. “They’re losing a lot of money but they’re holding the farm down. You learn more when things go wrong than when things go right.”

According to Cary, the wind farm is still making payments on a 15-year pilot program in lieu of taxes. It will be on the full tax roll by 2016.

“Once the capital project is done they have a good profit margin,” he said. “Now you have an industry that can stay here and amount to something.”