Risk Management in wind turbines: how to manage the technical risks of a wind farm fleet
By Javier Abril Lerga, co-founder of Growind Systems
In most wind farms, critical events rarely appear suddenly. They are the result of an evolution that builds up over time. And yet, when they finally occur, they always seem like a surprise.
This is the paradox of technical risk in wind energy operations: it is known, it is documented, and yet it is not managed. Over the past months we have published a ten-part series on LinkedIn on this topic, based on what we see every week working with real fleets. This article summarises the main ideas from that series.
1. Risks don’t fail, they degrade
Most of the most relevant technical risks are not linked to sudden failures, but to progressive degradation processes that have not been contained in time. The problem is not that they exist, but how they are managed.
In many cases, these risks are known: the manufacturer has identified them, the maintenance team has seen them, or the monitoring systems have detected them. Even so, their evolution is not always tracked systematically.
A key mistake often appears here: the risk is treated as if it were an incident, when in reality it is a process. An incident is managed when it occurs; a technical risk requires follow-up before, during and after its development.
When there is no structured control — periodic inspections, clear intervention criteria, condition monitoring with evidence — the outcome is fairly predictable: the system absorbs degradation until it can no longer hold. When it finally fails, it seems like something isolated. But it is not: it is the accumulated consequence of degradation that was not contained in time.
2. How an uncontrolled risk evolves: the case of mainframe cracks
To understand how a technical risk behaves in operation, it helps to look at a concrete case. Cracks in the mainframe follow a fairly recognisable pattern:
1. Origin. The problem may stem from design or manufacturing and be aggravated by operating conditions. It is there from the start, even if not visible.
2. Silent phase. The crack is not visible in routine visual inspection. It evolves under load. It generates no clear signal in SCADA or CMS.
3. Detection. It appears in an inspection, an OEM report or a specific review. This is where the critical moment begins.
4. No intervention. It is documented but not acted upon. Or partial measures are applied — containment holes, reinforcement welds — without a clear follow-up plan. The risk is known but not controlled.
5. Failure. The crack reaches a critical point. The intervention can no longer wait, and its cost — in time and lost generation — is several times higher than early action would have been.
The failure was not sudden: it was the predictable result of an evolution that was not contained. At none of the stages 1 to 4 was reaching failure inevitable.
3. Risks arising from the process, not the component
Last year we reviewed a fleet where the same turbine model had a pitch failure rate three times higher in some wind farms than in others. Same manufacturer, same technology, different result.
The difference was not in the hydraulic cylinders. It was in how they were maintained.
When we analyse risks in operating wind farms, the same pattern always appears: hub leaks that have been “under control” for months, fans out of service that become normalised, damaged cables that never get prioritised.
These risks do not usually arise in the design or manufacturing phase. They arise in the operation of the machines. And that has an important implication: they can be contained through maintenance.
They are risks associated with use, operating conditions and, in many cases, how maintenance tasks are carried out. They do not usually appear suddenly: small leaks, incipient wear, repetitive anomalies that, if not addressed in a structured way, end up developing further.
Sometimes the owner has no direct ability to influence how the maintenance contractor carries out tasks. But that does not eliminate their responsibility. If you have the risks identified, you also have an obligation to follow up, to request evidence, to detect when something is not progressing as it should.
That is where it is decided whether the risk is controlled or allowed to evolve.
4. “The risk is under control.” Are you sure?
One of the phrases we hear most often in wind farm audits is: “we already have that risk under control.” When we ask to see the history, the intervention criteria and the follow-up evidence… the silence says more than any answer.
Having a risk identified is not the same as having it managed. In many organisations, managing technical risks starts — and ends — with a list.
For a risk to be truly managed, it needs:
- A clear definition, without ambiguity
- A concrete scope: technology, wind farms, machines
- A history that allows its evolution to be understood
- A supervision plan: who, how and when it is reviewed
- Concrete containment actions
- A process that ensures follow-up and detection of deviations
- EVIDENCE to support all of the above
Without these elements, the risk is not part of the system. It is just a record. It is not being managed — it is being observed.
5. The risk spreadsheet nobody updates
In a recent review, we asked for the updated risk map of a fleet of 65 turbines. We were sent a spreadsheet with a last modified date of 14 months earlier.
The risk map existed, but it had gone more than a year without reflecting the reality of operations. And the most common reason is not that nobody updates it out of laziness — it is that the spreadsheet is not designed to be updated easily.
What happens over time:
- Each person interprets the criteria in their own way
- Critical information ends up in emails and in the memory of specific individuals
- There is no connection to what is happening in the field
The underlying problem is not the tool — it is the absence of a system to support it.
A risk assessment system should allow something that a spreadsheet cannot: knowing in real time which risks are active and in what state, connecting each risk to maintenance activities, and applying the same criteria across the entire organisation.
When we start working with a new portfolio, one of the first things we do is precisely this: understand where the risk information lives and whether that information is operational or merely documentary. The difference between the two defines, to a large extent, the real management capacity of that
6. “Marcos has that information… but Marcos is gone”
It is one of the most common situations we find when we start working with a new organisation. The critical technical knowledge about a fleet’s risks is not in any system. It is in people.
And when those people leave, retire or move to another project, that knowledge goes with them.
The information usually exists. The problem is that it is not accessible or usable in a systematic way:
- OEM technical bulletins in unindexed folders
- Failure histories in emails between technicians
- Inspections in PDFs with no naming convention
- Intervention decisions that were never documented
The result is that each risk review starts almost from scratch. Analyses that have already been done are repeated. Patterns that would have allowed problems to be anticipated are lost.
For a risk to be truly managed, it needs a minimum documentary base: a repository with root causes, manufacturer communications and field evidence; a clear history of what happened, when and what was decided; and traceability that allows the evolution of the risk to be reconstructed at any time.
Documenting is not bureaucracy. It is the condition for technical knowledge to survive the people who generate it.
7. The diagnosis was done. The risks were still there.
In the wind energy sector I come across this frequently: the diagnosis is well done, the audit is solid, the risks are identified, the report is complete. Nobody can say the work was not done.
And yet, the risks are still there and they evolve. Identifying a risk and managing it are two different things.
When you scratch the surface, the same reasons almost always appear:
- The report is filed and nothing else happens. It does not change any preventive maintenance, it does not appear in follow-up meetings, it does not modify how inspections are carried out. It was delivered, it was read, and there it stayed.
- Nobody has that risk on their list. It is documented, yes. But if you ask who is responsible for following up on it, there is silence. What has no owner does not progress.
This is exactly where the process breaks down.
Managing risks is not a project that gets closed. It is something that has to live within the operation: with periodic reviews, with clear criteria for escalation, with someone who has it in their day-to-day work.
A good diagnosis without follow-up is like those medical test results that end up in a drawer. The problem does not disappear because it is on paper.
8. Can AI autonomously manage the technical risks of a wind farm fleet?
Recently, a client asked us whether AI could autonomously manage the technical risks of their fleet. We told them no. And then we explained what it can do, which is not insignificant.
Throughout this series we have seen a recurring pattern: the risks are identified, the information exists, but it is scattered, in different formats, in the hands of different people. And making that system operational on a day-to-day basis is very difficult.
That is where AI starts to make sense. Not as a substitute for technical judgement, but as a layer that makes manageable what would otherwise become ungovernable.
What AI can contribute in practice:
Access to unstructured information. Being able to query OEM bulletins, inspection reports or maintenance histories as if they were a database. Reducing dependence on whoever “remembers where that document was”.
Cross-sectional analysis. Crossing failure histories, SCADA behaviour and field inspections without needing a completely rigid structure. Detecting patterns that are not visible when reviewing turbine by turbine.
Coordination between people and systems. So that risk follow-up does not depend on someone remembering to call, send an email or search the history. AI can act as the connecting thread between field technicians, O&M managers and the available information.
What AI cannot do:
- Define the technical severity criteria
- Replace the experience of whoever knows the machine
- Create a system where none exists
If there is no defined management process, AI does not invent one. But when that process exists, it can turn something that until now was difficult to sustain over time into something that works systematically.
Conclusion: from identification to real management
Throughout this series we have seen that the problem of risk management in wind energy operations is rarely in the identification of risks. It lies in everything that comes after.
Risks are identified. They are documented. And then they end up in reports, spreadsheets, in the memory of one or two key people. Without a system that keeps them alive within the operation, the diagnosis is worthless.
The good news is that this has a solution. And it does not require large technology investments from day one. It requires, above all, clarity about which risks exist, who is responsible for each one and how follow-up is carried out.
At Growind Systems we work precisely on this: helping operators and asset managers turn identified technical risks into something that is truly managed, systematically and with evidence.
If you recognise any of these situations in your operation, contact us and let’s talk.
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