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LINKING PEOPLE, JOINING NATIONS
For the near future, as a result, with developing countries wanting to use fossil
fuels to service their growing populations, this situation is not expected to lessen greatly.
The welding industry, in consideration of this, has therefore played a prominent role in
the application and development of new state-of-the-art processes and procedures in the
construction, inspection and repair of coal-fired and nuclear power generation plants. This
issue has achieved greater relevance through the growing synergy and participation between
Working Units in IIW to demonstrate the importance of structural health monitoring (SHM)
through a workshop held at the 68th Annual Assembly and Conference held in Helsinki in
2015. Over 60 delegates from 17 countries attended the workshop that covered the extension
of the life of ageing structural assets beyond normal economic restraints through the use of
the latest techniques, such as sensors, to manage degradation and provide a high level of
confidence in the integrity of such assets.
Power from fossil fuel plant is now diminishing rapidly and, despite
initial setbacks caused by the Fukushima tsunami in 2011, the interest
in nuclear power capacity as an alternative has increased significantly in
more recent times with over 60 reactors currently under construction in 15
countries, notably China, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and
Russia.
4
China on the other hand has also signalled a significant change from
fossil fuel dependency to renewable energy sources from 2015 on. China’s
influence as a major promoter of international infrastructure development
in Africa and Central Asia therefore carries strong implications for other
developing countries’ energy and the choices that they will make.
5
It is
simpler and more effective to use solar and wind power to individually
service more isolated communities than to provide energy through an
extensive supply and grid network, a situation which is now becoming more
common in developed countries.
Wind power has now become the world’s fastest growing energy source over the last
decade and has also become one of its most rapidly expanding industries with sales of over
USD 3 billion in 2008.
6
By 2012 it had become a USD 10 billion/year industry in the USA
alone, with wind energy accounting for 40% of the increased electricity capacity for that
year in the USA
7
. China has rapidly become a world leader in wind power and now ranks
fourth in installed capacity.
8
In Europe, wind farms have also increased at an exponential
rate with both Denmark and Portugal producing over 20% of their total electricity
production through wind generated power. Conventional and advanced welding processes
have been the key to the construction of wind turbines, in particular submerged arc welding
and GMAW processes, employing, in some situations, robotic welding to reduce costs of
manufacture and to increase productivity. This has made wind power more competitive as
a source of energy.