Offshore wind turbines are getting an increasing portion among the wind installations around the world and could play a significant role in the EU energy targets of 2030. These wind farms are usually installed at shallow water areas and are located usually in less than 30km from the coastline and are vulnerable to lightning strikes. In the current paper is investigated the grounding system efficiency of such type of wind turbine based on a fixed bottom foundation at Baltic Sea. Lightning strikes are simulated in ATP-EMTP with several peak currents and performance of grounding system is evaluated. Extracted results could be useful for the project economics and investment cost optimization.

Grounding, lightning, offshore, wind turbines