General Electric Renovables Espana, S.l.

Justin Edwin Barton

Frederick Wilson Wheeler

Manthram Sivasubramaniam

Pranav Agarwal

Misha Gupta

Vidya Sagar Meesala

The present disclosure is directed to a method for responding to a friction coefficient signal of a pitch bearing of a pitch drive mechanism of a wind turbine and/or for controlling the pitch drive mechanism(s) and/or a bank of ultracapacitors. The method and system include: accessing high-frequency measurement data of the at least one pitch bearing; estimating, via a torque balance model implemented by a controller, a frictional torque of the at least one pitch bearing based, at least in part, on the high-frequency measurement data; estimating, via the controller, a friction coefficient signal of the at least one pitch bearing based, at least in part, on the frictional torque; comparing the friction coefficient signal with a friction threshold; determining whether the friction coefficient signal deviates from the friction threshold based, at least in part, on the comparison; and, if so, acting.

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Glenville, NY, United States of America

Justin Edwin Barton