This document discusses root cause analysis (RCA) processes for wind turbine blade failures. It recommends conducting an RCA after a blade fails to obtain a thorough understanding of the failure, inform risk assessments, and identify corrective actions. The document outlines the key steps in an RCA process according to international standard IEC 62740, including establishing facts through careful visual and thermal inspections of the failed blade. It also recommends using visualization tools to analyze data and present RCA results, while maintaining flexibility to adapt the process to each failure. The overall message is that RCAs should be conducted for all blade failures to uncover risks and actions that might otherwise be missed.

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Panel: Blade Root Cause Analysis
Processes and Inspection Methods
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2016 Sandia Blade Workshop

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Background
 Why conduct an RCA?
– Obtain more thorough understanding of what happened
– Possibly assign responsibility
– Inform risk to remainder of blade fleet
– Take meaningful corrective action
 For blades, evidence can be challenging to gather
 Causal factors may be detectable quickly and easily - or not at all
 Root cause analysis needs a structured approach that allows
flexibility to “follow your nose”
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IEC 62740:2015
1. Initiation
2. Establishing Facts
3. Analysis
4. Validation
5. Presentation of results
 Other process guidance: 8D, 5 Whys, DMAIC
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Establishing Facts: Inspection
 Preserve evidence. Thoroughly photograph uptower components
and the debris field as early as possible.
 Careful visual inspection, specifically internal inspections, are
valuable; use appropriate confined space procedures.
Experienced eyes are needed.
 Remote thermography continues to show great potential, but
image interpretation can be challenging.
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Tools for Analysis and Presentation of Results
 Visualization: Causal diagrams, Apollo, Bowtie XP
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Takeaways
 When a blade fails, do the RCA! Without it, risks and effective
corrective actions may not be uncovered.
 Standardize the RCA process… but be flexible and use the tools
and processes that fit the failure.
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Matt Malkin
matthew.malkin@dnvgl.com
206-387-4296