Journal Pre-proof

Estimating the Impact of Drone-based Inspection on the Levelised Cost of Electricity

for Offshore Wind Farms

Khristopher Kabbabe Poleo, William J. Crowther, Mike Barnes

PII: S2590-1230(21)00002-5
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rineng.2021.100201
Reference: RINENG 100201

To appear in: Results in Engineering

Received Date: 12 October 2020

Revised Date: 8 December 2020
Accepted Date: 29 December 2020

Please cite this article as: K.K. Poleo, W.J. Crowther, M. Barnes, Estimating the Impact of Drone-based
Inspection on the Levelised Cost of Electricity for Offshore Wind Farms, Results in Engineering, https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.rineng.2021.100201.

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© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V.

Estimating the Impact of Drone-based Inspection on the Levelised Cost of
Electricity for Offshore Wind Farms
Khristopher Kabbabe Poleo*, William J. Crowther*, Mike Barnes**
*
Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Civil Engineering, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK
**
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK

HIGHLIGHTS
• A new cost model for predicting the Levelised Cost of Electricity from offshore wind
• Model informs wind farm operators on the costs of drone inspection techniques
• Model informs Drone Service Providers on the cost of higher levels of autonomy
• Greatest cost benefit comes from changing ropes to drones for visual inspection
• High levels of autonomy offer marginal benefit and is currently not worth pursuing

ABSTRACT

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Using drones for infrastructure inspection is becoming routine, driven by the benefit of reducing risk and costs. In this
paper, the business case for drone-based inspection is examined from the perspective of the wind farm operator and the

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Drone Service Provider (DSP). A physical and financial model of an offshore wind farm is built using techno-economic
analysis and activity-based costing, and data from the open literature. Drone operational models are developed based on
domain specific knowledge of operation practices and the predicted physical environment. Rope-access inspection is used as
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a baseline and accounts for 0.7% of the wind farm operational expenditure. Replacing rope-access inspection with drones
reduces costs by up to 70% and decreases revenue lost due to down-time by up to 90%. Increasing autonomy of drones
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increases the speed at which inspections can be performed but increases costs and complexity. For wind farm operator there
is marginal economic benefit (2% reduction in inspection costs) in moving towards a fully autonomous drone-based
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inspection system from the current visual line of sight operation of single drone. However, from the point of view of the
DSP, fully autonomous operations allow greater scalability of the business and enables higher utilisation of the fleet.

KEYWORDS:
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LCOE; Offshore Wind; Unmanned aerial vehicles; Cost benefit analysis; Visual Inspection

1. INTRODUCTION
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The use of drone technology for infrastructure inspection and maintenance is becoming increasingly routine. In the
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construction industry drones have gone from being an innovative solution for surveying large areas, to a routine tool for
local onsite surveys [1]. In the energy industry, drone adoption has been driven by the immediate safety benefit of
eliminating the need for working at height and the promise of reduced costs through faster inspection times and elimination
of specialist access equipment and training. Example cost saving opportunities due to drone use specific to the energy sector
are highlighted in [2] and [3]. These studies, however, only show direct costs associated with drone inspection techniques
and do not consider the overall economic impact of the Operation and Maintenance (O&M) strategy. We aim to understand
the economic impact of drone-based inspection for offshore wind by evaluating the effects of changing inspection
technology on the overall operational expenditure and on revenue, thus defining the link between technology
implementation and the Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE). The methodology is relevant to offshore wind farm operators,
as it describes the gains and costs avoided by adopting autonomous systems and is relevant to drone service providers in that
it provides insight into the links between automation and business growth. The work is novel in that to the authors’
knowledge it documents the first quantitative, model-based study to assess economic benefits of drone use for offshore
inspection. Previous studies have highlighted applications for drones [4], [5], [6] and others changes in working practices
that they introduce [2], however these studies are unable to translate general findings into specific changes in LCOE due to
absence of appropriate techno-economic models.

LCOE is used as a standard measure of what it costs to produce a unit of electrical energy, usually quoted in £ per MWh.
It considers all the associated costs of producing power over the lifetime of the asset. LCOE is often used to develop policy
on implementation of different methods for electricity production [7],. Calculating LCOE for energy projects requires an
estimation of Capital and Operational Expenditure (CAPEX and OPEX), as well as the total revenue generated over the life
of the project. This information is often commercially sensitive and not openly available. To overcome this, we have
developed and evaluated mathematical models for estimating LCOE based on individual system expenditure as a result of

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failure [9]. Other studies have derived probabilistic models for possible OPEX and CAPEX costs and applied Monte Carlo
techniques to investigate how varying inputs affects LCOE for various energy sectors like wind [10], natural gas [11], wave
[12], and hydropower [13]. These studies show how a range of LCOE values can be estimated and compared against
different production technologies and how external influences, like current policies and government targets, can affect costs.
However, further work into understanding the costs of specific aspects of OPEX would still need to be done to understand
how processes and technologies would affects LCOE. In the present paper, we use LCOE as a performance indicator for
specific methods and technologies. The methodology described herein makes no attempt to derive a precise LCOE
estimation for wind, instead, it allows for technologies to be compared by understanding the influence of a certain process
on the LCOE and thus allowing comparison of new technology scenarios. Specifically, it analyses the costs and revenue
deltas for performing visual inspection of wind turbines using Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), also referred to as
drones. The case study considers three technological adoption scenarios: direct control of a drone by an operator within
visual line of sight, a multi-vehicle system supervised from a remote station and a fully autonomous system. The method for
estimating baseline LCOE is similar to techniques that have been successfully applied in the oil and gas industry [14].

The cost requirements for drone-based inspection systems are evaluated first via Techno Economic Analysis (TEA) and
then by analysing how the technology would be implemented in practice via a time-driven Activity Based Costing (ABC).
The application of these tools in isolation is well proven. In [15], TEA techniques are used for evaluating wind farm cost

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saving opportunities based on geographical features and layouts for a Round 3 offshore site in the UK. In [14], ABC
techniques are used for evaluating OPEX in the offshore oil and gas industry. The method works well when the tasks

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required for evaluation are well specified. A drawback of ABC is that it can be expensive in terms of resources when a
comprehensive assessment of the task is needed [16].
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In this paper TEA and ABC tool is used for: (i) understanding the capabilities and requirements that drone inspection
techniques will bring, (ii) estimating the cost of inspecting the offshore wind turbines in a representative environment, and
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(iii) estimating the cost of the current rope-access inspection process.
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2. TECHNOLOGY REVIEW OF DRONE SYSTEMS

2.1. OVERVIEW
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Robotics and autonomous systems are anticipated to be an integral part of the operations and maintenance processes for
future wind farms [17]. This section is to provide a succinct summary of current and future trends in drone systems used for
inspection and maintenance to provide a foundation for choice of case study groupings as part of the LCOE analysis in
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section 4. The review is organised under the headings of Vehicles, Sensor Payloads, Command and Control (C2) and
Computing.
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2.2. VEHICLES
The description “drone” has now been widely adopted as a generic term for a flying robot. More formally, Remotely
Piloted Air System (RPAS), is used by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), and Small Unmanned
Surveillance Aircraft (SUSA) is the official term adopted in the UK’s Air Navigation Order [18], [19], [20].

In Europe, unmanned aircraft systems over 150kg are governed by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA)
and they have the same certification requirements as any other manned aircraft [21].. In the UK, the Air Navigation Order
(ANO) separates drones into 2 categories: (1) below 20 kg take-off mass, including batteries and fuel, and (2) between 20 to
150 kg take-off mass [20]. Legislation is more stringent on the heavier class of vehicles. In this paper we will investigate
technologies and methodologies most applicable to aircraft below 20 kg take-off mass, due to their greater ubiquity for
industrial inspection tasks.

Figure 1 shows the three main types of drone systems encountered. (a) Rotary wing (helicopter or multirotor) (b) fixed
wing (conventional aeroplane), and (c) hybrid systems (c).

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 Figure 1: Rotary wing (a), Fixed wing (b), and hybrid (c) aircraft examples.

Rotary wing vehicles have been adopted by industry faster than fixed wing [22], [23]. The advantages of rotary wing
vehicles over traditional fixed wing aircraft are that they can hover, the footprint required to operate is smaller, and the skills
required to operate them are significantly reduced. On the other hand, fixed wing aircraft offer greater forward flying
efficiency which translates to longer range and higher endurance. Hybrid vehicles attempt to combine the best attributes of
fixed and rotary wing vehicles, typically at the expense of increased structural weight and complexity for the same payload
capability [24].

2.3. PAYLOAD SENSORS

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2.3.1. Payload sizing
. The endurance and payload capacity that some typical battery powered sub 20 kg commercial drones is shown in Figure

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2 [25], [26], [27]. A 20-minute mission duration is typical. This relatively short operational time is limited by currently
available battery technology.

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Alta 6
Hover endurance at sea level [Minutes]

45
Wind 4
40
M600
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35
Wind 8
30
M200 V2
25
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20
15
10
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5
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
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Payload weight [kg]

Figure 2: Payload-Endurance chart showing the payload weight that can be carried by typical commercial drones within the 20 kg max
all up weight limit.

2.3.2. Passive sensing

Visual spectrum cameras
Cameras are most common payload of the current generation of commercially available drones [28], [29]. A small Mavic
2 enterprise platform, for example, is able to achieve a Ground Sampling Distance (GSD) of 2mm/pixel at its maximum
zoom level at a 5 meter distance from the target [30]. Camera systems integrated with the aircraft make use of the flight
control system sensors to add information like camera positioning and attitude to the metadata of the images taken. This
adds significant value to inspection data.

Thermal
Current systems offer full HD or 4K RGB systems and 640x512 thermal sensors collocated, allowing visual and thermal
images to be superimposed. Thermal systems usually will have fixed optics (no optical zoom) meaning the drone must be
close to the target to achieve a high sample resolution. In addition, sensors with increased resolution or framerate may be
subject to ITAR restrictions.

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2.3.3. Active sensors
Lidar
Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) sensors are becoming increasingly available for sub 20 kg aircraft systems. They
are mainly used for surveying or navigation (sense and avoid). Survey grade LIDAR are normally paired with a differential
or Real-Time Kinematic Global Positioning System (RTK-GPS) to improve geolocation of the data, and newer systems are
equipped with cameras to add texture to point cloud data.

Radar
Use of radar-based inspection tools is of increasing interest as the typical weight of an operationally useful system is now
within the SWAP capability of sub-20 kg drones. These systems work by comparing the radar return against a library of
data from different characterised materials [4]. Radar-based inspection systems offer information on subsurface features that
complements optical inspection data [31]. For drone application, the technology is limited by the relatively narrow field of
view of flight capable sensors and the relatively slow capture rate (of the order of seconds for radar compared with
microseconds for vision).

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2.4. COMMAND AND CONTROL
Drone command and control (C2) requires low latency, high integrity but relatively low bandwidth communications. 5G

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services could in the future be used for both C2 and data transmission for drones. [32], [33], [34]. Table 1 shows the
minimum bandwidth required for transmission of data from a range of sensors on a drone to a remote monitoring station.
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The reference data rate for 5G is thought to be at least 25Mbit/s in uplink and at least twice that for downloads, with a
latency of around 10ms [35]. This would allow each drone to be able to stream 2 x 4K camera streams at 30 fps, a front FPV
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camera of lower resolution, the flight control system telemetry from the aircraft, and C2 signals. Work on demonstrating the
use of 5G infrastructure for offshore wind farm monitoring is already underway [36].
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Table 1: Typical bandwidth requirement for various services which are needed for visually operating a drone.

Service Bandwidth required Source

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RAW Depth @ 720p – 30 fps 400 Mbps [37]

RAW Thermal @ 480p – 30 fps 137 Mbps [38]
Video @ 4K – 60 fps 16 Mbps [39]
Video @ 1080p - 30fps 6 Mbps [39]
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Video (front FPV camera) 1 to 2 Mbps [39]

C2-MAVLink control stream 0.4 Mbps [40]
C2-Futaba SBUS protocol 0.1 Mbps [41]
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2.5. COMPUTING CAPABILITIES

Currently, wind farms generate large amounts of data from fixed instrumentation used mainly for system monitoring
[42]. Expectation is that the data can be used for understanding the reliability of the components [43] and the effect that
failures have on the rest of the system [44], [9]. Table 2 shows modern small form factor computer boards compatible with
the SWAP constraints of current industrial drones [45], [46], and [47]. It is likely that future drones used in industrial
applications will be capable of both acquiring and processing data in near-real time.

Table 2: Example embedded computing boards suitable for on board data processing in sub 20 kg drones. The computing power required
for flight control functions is typically orders of magnitude smaller than that required for image processing.

Coral [45] NUCi7 [46] AGX Xavier [47]

Developer Google Intel NVidia

Size 8.8 x 6.0 cm 11.5 x 11.5 cm 8.7 x 10 cm
Weight 150gr 600gr 630gr
Power 15 W 28 W 30 W
Cost < £200 < £1,000 < £1,500

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 The main use case for drones in offshore power is typically remote observation. Drones are currently operated within
Visual Line Of Sight (VLOS) by a pilot with direct control of the aircraft [48]. Historical trends in the development of flight
control and mission capability for commercial drones are shown in Table 3. With each iteration more tasks are offloaded to
onboard computing, freeing the pilot to perform the mission critical aspects of the operation. However, we are still multiple
generations away from a fully autonomous drone able to perform missions in which the drone itself can understand its task
in the same way a human operator can [49], [50]. This table consider consumer level drones as there is available historical
information regarding their software capability.

Table 3: Historical delegation of tasks from Pilot to Flight Control System (FCS) for a commercial drone product line ( DJI Phantom)
[51], [52].

Version: F450 Naza P-1 P-2 P-3 Phantom 4 V2.0

Year released: 2012 Jan-13 Dec-13 2015 2018

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Flight feature Responsibility

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Low level control: FCS
Altitude hover hold: Pilot FCS
Position hover hold (GPS): Pilot FCS
Position hover hold (no GPS):
RTL failsafe action:
Pilot
Pilot
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FCS
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Battery management: Pilot FCS
Obstacle avoidance (forward): Pilot FCS
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Obstacle avoidance (3D): Pilot

Air traffic avoidance: Pilot
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Pre-flight self-health checklist: Pilot FCS

Mission features
Flight path following: Pilot FCS
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Object tracking: Pilot FCS

Report on target: Pilot
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Report on mission status: Pilot

3. METHODOLOGY

3.1. OPERATIONS AND MAINTENANCE COST ESTIMATION FOR OFFSHORE WINDFARMS

To understand the impact of drone technology adoption on the LCOE, the current operating costs of an offshore wind
farm must be understood. Obtaining data on these costs is difficult as there is no regulatory requirement for companies to
publish their expenditure. In the UK, the Crown Estate, who oversee the territory where offshore wind farms operate, has
published estimates of current expenditure for a baseline 500MW wind farm [53]. Data is summarised in Table 4. This
information provides the foundation for calculating OPEX for a generic wind farm installation used for our case study.

Eq. (1) represents the operational expenditure of a given year (
) as the sum of all work package element () in table 4,
where  is the installed power factor eq. (2),  is the nameplate capacity of the turbine,
 is the number of turbines, and
 is the nominal capacity from the data, in this particular case 500MW, and is a weighting, between 0 and 2, to define
the expected cost between the quoted maximum and minimum values eq. (3).

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 Table 4: Operations and Maintenance costs by work package for a 500MW offshore wind farm in the UK [53].

Work Package elements (

 ) Cost range per year per 500MW installed (£1k)
Offshore accommodation / base £10,000 to £20,000
Crane barge services £4,000 to £12,000
Turbine spare parts £3,000 to £6,000
Turbine maintenance £2,000 to £8,000
Work boats £2,000 to £3,000
Aviation (per aircraft) £1,500 to £3,000
SCADA and condition monitoring £400 to £800
SAP and marine co-ordination £400 to £800
Onshore logistics £400 to £700
Scour and structural surveys £200 to £600
Administration £200 to £500
Array cable surveys and repairs £200 to £500
Foundation repairs £100 to £600
Lifting, climbing and safety equipment £100 to £200
Offshore substation maintenance £50 to £200

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Export cable surveys and repairs £50 to £200
Weather forecasting £40 to £90
Onshore electricals £10 to £100

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Total = £24,660 to £57,290


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  + 2 − 
 
  =     1
2
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!" #
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 = (2)
!

0 ≤ ≤ 2 3
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3.2. REVENUE ESTIMATION

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In addition to OPEX, the total amount of revenue from electricity generation must be understood. Energy generated over
a time interval is a function of the nameplate capacity of the asset and the weather conditions on site (capacity factor).
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Practically, other factors, like the availability of the asset must also be considered. Eq. (4) is used to estimate the average
revenue generated on a given time interval,

' =
  ( ) *, (4)

where ' is the energy generated over a time period (*), ) is the capacity factor, and ( is the assumed availability of
the turbine. Availability is defined as the percentage of the time the farm is operational over a given time period.

If wind data is available, eq. (4) can be rearranged for estimating capacity factor over the life
, of the farm, eq. (5).


∑
.
'
) = 
5


 (

Revenue for given year 01 is a function of the energy generated ' and the current selling price of electricity 2'3
eq. (6).

01 = 2'3 ' 6

 

Analysis of revenue also allows for the economic effect of shutdown to be measured.

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3.2.1. Example: Revenue loss due to unscheduled shutdown for an offshore 3.6MW turbine.
Consider a turbine with power and wind availability curves shown in Figure 3. The turbine is part of a farm located 20km
off the coast of Kent, UK, for which wind data between 2004 and 2010 is available [54].

0.12 4.0
3.5
0.10
Historical 3.0
0.08 wind data

Pout [MW]
Probability
2.5
0.06 Wind turbine 2.0
Power Curve
1.5
0.04
1.0
0.02
0.5
0.00 0.0
Vw [m/s]
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27

Figure 3: Assumed power output as a function of wind speed for a 120m 3.6MW offshore turbine [55], and Distribution of historical

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wind data in 10 minute intervals between 2004 and 2010 at 82.3 mAMSL from [54].

Using the information from Figure 3, equations (4) through (6), and an assumed wholesale price of £65/MWh [56], the

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revenue loss due to an unscheduled random shutdown can be estimated.

Figure 4 shows the range of potential loss of revenue per turbine per hour of shutdown.

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0.3
0.25
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Probability

0.2
0.15
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0.1
0.05
0
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0 25 100 150 200 250 300

Revenue lost per turbine per hour of shutdown, £
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Figure 4: Likely loss of revenue during random unscheduled shut down per hour per turbine for an asset as described in
Figure 3.

3.2.2. Example: Yearly revenue of a wind farm.

For this example, we estimate the revenue generated for a 720MW wind farm. Reusing the historical wind data and
power curve, retaining the assumptions used in example 3.2.1, we can again use equations eq. (4)-(6) to estimate a baseline
revenue for the first year of production:

'5!67859:; = 200 ∗ 3.6 ∗ 1 ∗ 0.51 ∗ 365 ∗ 24 ?

ℎ

'5!67859:; = 3,216,672 ?
ℎ

01BC32 = 65 ∗ 3,216,672 = £209?

3.3. CAPITAL EXPENDITURE

Capital Expenditure CAPEX is the cost associated with commissioning, building, dismantling and recycling a wind farm.
It typically accounts for between 30% to 50% of the total LCOE [51-54]. We use available data from UK wind farms to
make an educated assumption of what it costs to build a farm. It is assumed that that the operator will be required to repay a
loan at a set interest rate.

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 CAPEX will also include the residual value of the asset after the useful life of the farm has elapsed and any investment
made during the life of the farm eq. (7). For this paper, we assume that CAPEX is composed entirely of repayment of a loan
acquired to construct the farm (L2 ). For a more complete analysis, a cash investment (LM ), and that the farm’s
residual value or remediation cost (L2N ) can be taken into account. The projected life of the farm is given by (
).

L  = ∑LM  + L2   − L2N (7)

L2N = 0, and LM = 0

L  = ∑ L2  (8)

3.3.1. Example: Yearly repayment of a £2B wind farm.

In this example we estimate the yearly repayment cost of the wind farm capital loan. If the interest to be paid remains
constant at 2.6% per year, that payments are made in a yearly basis at the end of each operating year and that the yearly total
of repayment and interests remain constant in absolute monetary terms until the loan is paid in full paid.

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Table 5: Loan terms for a £2B wind farm project

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Variable Value Notes
Total loan = £2,000,000,000 Assumes a 100% loan
Terms = 25 years Projected life of the farm
Interest rate =
Payments per year =

3.4. LEVELISED COST OF ELECTRICITY (LCOE)

2.6 %
£110M -p Fixed for the duration
Approx. for 25 years
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Now that CAPEX, OPEX, and revenue have been estimated, LCOE can be described in terms of the cost of producing
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electricity over the life of the wind farm eq. (9).


O PB = 9
'
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 is the expenditure incurred each year brought to a net present value eq. (10) and ' is the electricity generated

during the life of the farm as calculated using eq. (4), and Q is the discount rate of the farm. We assume for the initial
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analysis that the discount rate is equal to the yearly inflation rate.
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L  +  
 =  10
1 + Q


3.4.1. Example: LCOE for the 720MW farm

Using the data and projection from the previous examples, we estimate the LCOE of an offshore wind farm with
characteristics defined in Figure 6.

Table 6: Characteristics of the 720MW farm.

Variable Value Notes

Initial value = £2B Assumes a 100% loan
Repayment term = 25 years Assumed projected life
Interest rate = 2.6 % Fixed rate for 3 years
Fcap = 51 % Based on historical wind data
Cnp = 720 MW Nameplate capacity of the farm
Alpha = 95% Based on [57]
Inflation rate = 2.4% In lieu of a discount rate
CAPEX1-24 = £110M 24 CAPEX payments
CAPEX25 = £103M Last CAPEX payment
OPEX1 = £31M Operational cost for year 1

Using eq. (4) the potential electricity generated is estimated:

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 ' = 200 ∗ 3.6 ∗ 0.95 ∗ 0.51 ∗ 25 ∗ 365 ∗ 24 MWh

' = 76,395 U
ℎ, over 25 years.

 = £2.9 V

Therefore,

£W.XY
O = = £37.60 / MWh
Z[.\]^

These results are comparable with the latest strike prices for offshore wind generation published as part of the Contracts
for Difference (CfD) round 3 auctions of £39.65 /MWh [58]. Under these conditions, operators could see a profit of just
over £2 / MWh.

3.5. ACTIVITY BASED COSTING MODEL FOR WIND TURBINE SURVEY

Previous sections have been focused on estimating CAPEX, OPEX, and revenue for an offshore wind farm. The

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available OPEX data offers some useful insight into where most of the money is spent. However, there is no data available
which gives an understanding on how much specific tasks (i.e. wind turbine inspection) cost. To estimate this, a process

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called time-based Activity Based Costing (ABC) is used [14]. ABC is applied by understanding the cost per unit time
incurred when performing a task. In this paper the method is applied to understand the cost of various inspection methods,
including rope-access which will serve as a baseline.
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It is assumed that the overall cost of a process can be split into two: (i) the Directly Incurred (DI) cost of doing the task,
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i.e. workforce, transportation of people and parts, and consumables; and (ii) the change in revenue resulting from changing
processes.
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_`*2a)NN =  bcC)aNN + 01daN (11)

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DI cost and revenue change is then broken down into components and assign a cost per unit time eq. (12). For generic
offshore operations the main direct costs drivers are: workforce salaries, transportation, and consumables [14]. Revenue lost
per unit time is presented in section 3.2.1.
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 bc = ∑ e, *f, g_ ∗ * (12)

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Where e is the workforce cost derivative per unit time and is mainly made up from the salaries of the people involved. *f
is the transportation cost derivative per unit time, and comprises the boats, helicopters, or any other vehicle involved in
transporting people or equipment. g_ is the consumables cost derivative per unit time, in this case, tools, safety equipment,
or consumables used to complete the task. * is the time allocated to complete the activity.

3.5.1. Example: Rope-access inspection costs for a 500MW offshore wind farm.
In this example the DI cost associated with performing a rope-access based inspection of a wind farm is estimated.

Assume a wind farm with 139 turbines and a nameplate capacity of 500 MW, and that the turbines have the same
characteristics as those used in previous examples. Each turbine is visually inspected once a year by three technicians
employed by the operator, and the turbine is shut down during inspection. Furthermore, assume that 7 hours are allocated to
perform the inspection [3] and that the team carries out one inspection per day. Estimated directly incurred costs are shown
in Table 7. The same data is shown graphically in Figure 5 to illustrate the relative contribution of each element to the
overall inspection cost.

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 Table 7: DI cost of inspecting 139 individual wind turbines once a year: OPEX and revenue lost.

Item DI Cost per time unit Time-units required Notes

Workforce (Technicians) = £18/h 139*3*7 1 [59]
Workforce (boat) = £18/h 139*7 2
Transport (boat) = £600/day 139 3
Consumables = £1500/year 44
Onshore Admin = £20/day 139 3
Revenue lost (worst case) = £237/h 139*75
Total = Up to £392k per year

19%

Workforce
59% 21%
Transportation

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Consumables
Downtime

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2%

Figure 5: Distribution of direct costs and revenue lost for inspecting a 500MW farm once a year using rope-access methods.

3.6. TECHNO-ECONOMIC ANALYSIS FOR DRONE-BASED INSPECTION -p

In the previous section the cost of rope-access inspection was derived by understanding the key incurred costs and the
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time units required to complete the task. In this section we make use of Techno-Economic Analysis (TEA) to break down
the requirements to operate a UAS to perform visual inspection of wind turbines offshore and analyse their influence on the
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process. TEA is used to derive the costs under the same terms of workforce, transportation, and consumables used for ABC
analysis. Furthermore, 3 operating conditions will be investigated: (i) Operator controlling a single drone within Visual Line
of Sight (VLOS), (ii) Single operator controlling multiple drones within Extended VLOS (EVLOS), and (iii) Single operator
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managing a fleet Beyond VLOS (BVLOS). These operating conditions, represented by the pictograms in Figure 6,
represent the current and future trends for the technology.
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(i) (ii) (iii)

Figure 6: Pictogram representations for Single drone within VLOS (i), Multiple drones within EVLOS (ii), and multiple drones BVLOS
(iii) operating conditions.

3.6.1. Common elements for drone-based inspection

To legally operate any drone within a commercial environment, there is an expectation that the operator will need to
demonstrate: (a) competency for operating the proposed vehicle, (b) that the company has a policy in place to ensure

1
Based on 3 technicians, inspecting 139 turbines and assuming each turbine takes 7 hours to inspect.
2
Based on utilising 7 hours a day for 139 days.
3
1 day per turbine.
4
1 per person involved (3 wind turbine technicians and 1 boat operator).
5
Based on shutting down the turbine.

10
compliance with the ANO, (c) appropriate level of insurance, (d) a permission from the UK Civil Aviation Authority to
operate the drone in a commercial environment, (e) the expectation that any person involved in operating the drones will
keep themselves current in their abilities to fly and up to date with legislation and best practices [20], [21], [60].

(a) is normally achieved by receiving training and passing an assessment by a National Qualifying Entity (NQE), (b) is
achieved by producing an Operating Safety Case which specifies the companies policies and their operational procedures,
(c) procuring the right insurance level compliant with regulation (EC) 785/2004 [61]. (d) submitting an Operating Safety
Case (OSC) to the CAA along with the necessary forms and (e) by attending further training sessions and ensuring all
elements of the operation are regularly checked and updated where needed.

3.6.2. Time taken to visually inspect a 120m wind turbine

In [2] it is stated that a drone operated within Visual line of sight takes around 30 minutes to perform an inspection of a
wind turbine. These times were verified in simulation by creating a virtual environment using the Unity game engine, where
a drone system with similar characteristics to those referenced in Figure 2, and a camera system which matches the
performance and optics arrangement available off-the-shelf. Drone and payload specifications during the simulation are
shown in Table 8.

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Table 8: Aircraft and sensor parameters for simulating the time it takes to survey a 120m wind turbine

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Parameter Value
Aircraft = DJI Matrice 210 V2
Max horizontal speed = 17 m/s
Max Ascent speed =
Max Descent speed =
Estimated flight time =
-p
5 m/s
3 m/s
26 min
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Desired GSD = 0.11 cm/px
Camera FoV = 72 degrees
Camera resolution = 20.8 MP
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Distance from target = 5m

The asset used is a 120m 3.6MW turbine model. Human operators were able to complete an inspection with complete
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coverage of the turbine in around 15 to 30 minutes. A drone flying automatically, with no human intervention was able to
carry the inspection is just over 6 minutes, including travel time to the boat located 50 meters away from the turbine. The
automatic inspection was performed by setting waypoints around the turbine and having the drone fly whilst taking the
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photos. In addition, ray casting was used to measure the GSD of images being taken and a threshold was set and overlaid in
the image to get feedback on coverage. Green was set for anything better than a GSD of 0.11cm/px, up to 0.2cm per pixel
and white for unsuccessful or missing images. These values were arbitrarily selected based on the requirement of being able
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to visually ID a 10cm long crack on a blade.

Figure 7: Simulation environment in Unity showing wind turbine model with a path defined for the drone to follow and image quality
feedback overlay.

3.6.3. Operating a single drone within VLOS

The simplest case operating within the current legal framework in the UK is for a pilot to have control of a single drone
within VLOS [60]. The requirement being that an operator must be able to intervene in any situation where the aircraft
might endanger any person, vessel, or property not involved in the flying of the drone i.e. other air traffic users or vessels
operating nearby [20].

11
 Transportation: Currently, VLOS requirements are met by having the pilot near the wind turbine being inspected.
Therefore, there will still be a requirement for a workboat to provide transport to and from shore. The unit cost of
transportation will be comparable to that for rope-access inspection.

Workforce: Current best practices dictates that a second person is required to help the pilot during operations, acting as a
spotter/ground station operator. It is assumed that base salaries for drone operators are close to that of wind turbine
technicians, based on 2019 market rates. Hence, the overall personnel cost per unit time will be similar to that for rope-
access but will require fewer people.

Consumables: The cost of a drone able to operate within the physical environment and able to take images at the
required resolution will change depending on the specific requirements. As an example, drones mentioned in Figure 2
average around £15,000 in 2019 once a suitable optical payload is installed. A challenge when assigning a time unit cost to
the drone is that there are no definitive studies or information available on what the lifespan of these systems are under
offshore operating conditions. For this study we will assume drones have 4000 flight hours (fhrs) lifespan, based on flying
5h per workday for 3 years and that batteries and propellers are be replaced every 500 fhrs at a cost of £800 per set.

Table 9: List of DI costs associated with drone-based inspection within VLOS per unit time.

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Item Cost Frequency

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Workforce (WT technicians) = £18 Per person per hour
Workforce (boat) = £18 Per person per hour
Transport (boat) = £600 Per boat per day
Consumables (Drone) =
Consumables (Spares) =
Revenue lost (worst case) =
Training =
-p
£15000
£800
£237
£1500
Per drone per 4000fhrs
Per drone per 500fhrs
Per turbine per hour
Per pilot, one-off
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Insurance = £1500 Per year
CAA Fees = £750 Per year
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By using the key derived costs listed in Table 9 and applying time-driven ABC, it can be concluded that inspection cost
could be cut by around 90%. This is mainly driven by the reduction in revenue lost achieved by reducing the inspection time
from 7 hours, to half an hour. Directly incurred costs and revenue lost results are shown in Table 10. However, for
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infrequent drone inspections (one per turbine per year), it is more likely that wind farm operators would utilise Drone-as-a-
Service Providers (DSP) to undertake inspections.
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Table 10: Directly incurred cost of inspecting 139 individual wind turbines once a year: OPEX and revenue lost for drone based VLOS
case.
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Item DI Cost per time unit Units required

Workforce (WT technicians) = £18/h 18*2*7 6
Workforce (boat) = £18/h 18*7 7
Transport (boat) = £600/day 18
Consumables (Drone) = £3.75/h 18*7 7
Consumables (Spares) = £1.6/h 18*7 7
Revenue lost (worst case) = £237/h 139*0.5 8
Training = £1500/year 1
Insurance = £1500/year 1
CAA Fees = £750/year 1
Total = Up to £39k per year

6
Based on 2 drone operators being able to survey a 139 turbine farm in 18 days (8 turbines per day).
7
18 days for 7 hours each.
8
Assumes turbine needs to be shut down for 30 mins for inspection.

12
 Table 11: Daily rate estimation for a DSP operating VLOS based on directly incurred costs and assumed revenue, service uptake, and
drone reliability.

Cost per
Category Line item Qty Sub-Total Notes
year
Workforce Drone operators / technicians £30,000 12 £360,000 Based on 2019 market rates from
Workforce Management £45,000 3 £135,000 Accounts for management, HR, and PR roles
Workforce Senior leadership team £75,000 4 £300,000 Accounts for CEO, CTO, COO, and CFO
Workforce Support staff £25,000 3 £75,000 Accounts for supporting roles at 2019 market rates
Workforce Pension contribution £8,700 Pension contribution from the employer at 1%
Infrastructure Rent £12,000 1 £12,000 Based on 2019 market rates
Infrastructure Services £8,400 1 £8,400 Accounts for utilities, phone, and internet connections
Infrastructure Van £3,600 4 £14,400 Based on 2019 lease deals for work van style vehicles
Consumables Drones £36,000 4 £144,000 Assumes £9000 per drone per 250fhrs and 1000fhrs/year
Consumables Drone spares and tools £3,600 4 £14,400 Assumes 10% of the cost of the drone per year.
Consumables Fuel £2,838 4 £11,352 At 25k miles per vehicle at 50mpg at £1.25/l of fuel
Other Commercial van insurance £900 4 £3,600 Based on 2019 insurance rates for commercial vehicles

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Other Licensing fees and PfCO £2,500 1 £2,500 Based on 2019 CAA rates and CPD training for operators
Other Comprehensive drone insurance £1,200 4 £4,800 Based on 2019 quotes for VLOS operations

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Total operating cost = £1,094,152 Sum of all operating costs
Desired revenue = 30% 1 £328,245 Assumes a 30% profit over operating cost
Tax = 30% 1 £98,473 Assumes a 30% tax on the revenue
Total required income =
Service days available = 988
-p
£1,520,871
Based on 4 teams working 247 days in a year
re
Estimated daily rate = £1,540 Per day for VLOS operating conditions
3.7. OPERATING COSTS FOR A DRONE-AS-A-SERVICE PROVIDER (DSP)
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For a wind farm operator, to procuring services from a DSP reduces indirect costs. Furthermore, investment on
technology and responsibility for keeping current with legislation lies with the DSP. On the other hand, availability,
responsiveness, and flexibility of the services offered by DSPs might not suit wind farm operators during responsive
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maintenance operations. In addition, if the service is being used often, there might be economic advantages for wind farm
operators to develop their own in-house capability. This will depend on how often the service is being used, and/or if other
activities within the wind farm operations would see a benefit in employing the skills from the workforce, or the drones.
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As the responsibility to deliver a service lies with the DSP, the economic argument for higher levels of autonomy must
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now be made from their point of view. Therefore, the effect of technology on the daily rate must be investigated.

3.7.1. Example: DSP daily rate estimation and the effect of reliability.
This example introduces the main operating costs of a DSP to derive a daily rate, table 11. Costs are grouped into
categories, namely (i) workforce, (ii) infrastructure, (iii) consumables and (iv) others. Incurred costs are then analysed to
understand the key drivers of a daily rate.

A typical DSP will comprise of pilots, technical staff, and full-time administration support staff as their workforce;
infrastructure comprises of a location where they operate and vehicles used for transportation; consumables are drones
which have a finite useful life, spare parts, fuel (for transportation), etc.

The highest uncertainty around DSP costs lies with the reliability of the drones. The rate at which new products are
release to market means that drones are replaced long before they might fail due to fatigue. However, the effect of reliability
on the cost of the service, Figure 8, shows that the overall cost would change up to 10% if time between replacement, due to
failure or technology upgrade, lies within 250 to 1000 flight hours.

13
 6%
Workforce
Infrastructure
22%
Consumables
22% 6% Other

1% 58% Revenue
1% Tax
11% 2%
4%
64%
3%

Daily rates = £1390 to £1540

Figure 8: Cost breakdown of a DSP daily rate taking into account the influence of drone reliability assuming (i) 1000 flight hours, outer
chart, and (ii) 250 flight hours, inner chart.

Table 12: Daily rate estimation under (i) VLOS single drone operations, (ii) Multiple drones within EVLOS, and (iii) Multiple drones

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operating BVLOS

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Category

Single drone within VLOS

Inspection time per turbine: 30m
-p
Multiple drones within EVLOS

Inspection time per turbine: 6m

Multiple drones BVLOS

Inspection time per turbine: 6m

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Drones required Drones required per Drones required
Sub-total Sub-total Sub-total
per team per year team per year per team per year
9
Drones, spares @ £10k~40k = 4 £39k~£158k 20 £139k~£792k 40 £400k~£1,584k
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Insurance @ £1,2008 = 4 £4,800 20 £24,000 40 £48,000

Total drone related expenditure = £44k~£163k £222k~£816k £444k~£1,632k
Non-drone related expenditure = £931k £931k £931k
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Revenue = £292k~£328k £346k~£524k £412~£770k

Tax = £88k~£98k £104k~£157k £124k~£230
Required income = £1.35M~£1.5M £1.6M~£2.4M £1.9M~£3.5M
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Daily rate range = £1,376 ~ £1,539 £1,623 ~ £2,458 £1,935 ~ £3,606

4. DISCUSSION ON THE IMPACT OF TECHNOLOGY CASES

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4.1. IMPACT OF DIFFERENT TECHNOLOGIES ON DAILY RATES OF DSPS

Example 3.7.1 estimated the daily rate for a company operating a single drone per pilot operating within visual line of
sight, represented in technology case (i). This section summarises the direct cost driven by the introduction of EVLOS for
multiple vehicles (case ii), and operations BVLOS of an automated system (case iii). A key assumption is that the main
advantage of the technology is represented by an increase in the productivity of the DSP, at the expense of higher operating
costs driven mainly by the investment required in additional equipment. Increase in productivity is due to the increase in
number of drones and the reduction in inspection time.

Table 12 shows an estimate for daily rates of operation for a DSP where the workforce, infrastructure and other non-
drone related expenses are kept and the change in technology allows for single operator to fly multiple drones with the
objective of increasing the capability and productivity of the team. For a wind farm operator this translates to a higher
number of inspections per day of operation. For a DSP this translates to higher operational capability.

9
Per team per year.

14
 The importance to understand the reliability of the drone will obviously increase as technology progresses and allows
multiple drones to be operated BVLOS. The data presented in Table 12 is also shown in Figure 9 to graphically demonstrate
the influence of the drone cost on the daily rate for the operation. The error bar in the figure only takes into account the
uncertainty around the reliability of the drones, the error around uncertainty from legislation, insurance, and operations
needs further investigating.

£4,500

DSP daily rate

£3,000

£1,500

£0
(i) (ii) (iii)

Figure 9: DSP daily rate for technology cases (i), (ii), and (iii). assuming between 200 and 1000 flight hours between replacement with a

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nominal of 250 flight hours.

To bring Figure 9 into the context of the wind farm we can present the data based on inspection cost per turbine. Figure

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10 shows the cost per inspected turbine. The next section analyses the impact on the LCOE from these technologies.

£200
-p
Inspection cost [£/turbine]

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£150

£100
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£50
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£-
(i) (ii) (iii)
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Figure 10: Inspection cost per turbine under various technology cases (i), (ii), and (iii) for flight times of between 200 and 1000 flight
hours between replacement.
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4.2. IMPACT OF DIFFERENT TECHNOLOGIES ON LCOE

Introducing unmanned aircraft systems for the inspection of wind turbines decreases the operational expenditure and
increases the overall availability of the turbine.

Revenue gained can also be plotted as a function of the installed capacity to better understand the potential of increasing
the inspection speed as a tool to decrease downtime. Figure 11 shows how introducing drones enables an extra £375 per
year per installed MWh to be generated. For the London Array this would mean an extra revenue of over £230,000 per year.

£400
Additional revenue per year [£/MW]

£300

£200

£100

£-
(i) (ii) (iii)

Figure 11: Additional revenue generated per technology case due to increase in availability.

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 OPEX

Rev. Lost

47%
53%

Baseline cost = £ 520k

24 1
% 3… 1
8 6…
76 8
7…
% 4…

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Case (i) = £ 81k Case (ii) = £ 28k Case (iii) = £ 25k

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Figure 12: Comparison of OPEX and Rev. Lost contribution to the overall inspection cost of each technology.

The economic value of a technology can be assessed by understanding the effect that the technology will have on the
-p
LCOE. Figure 13 shows the change in LCOE due to introduction of different drone inspection techniques compared to the
baseline rope-access methods. This result is valid for the case of outsourcing the service to a DSP and assuming a single
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inspection is required per year. If the inspection rate is increased, the benefit will be enhanced. Note that this LCOE
reduction estimation is a direct result generated by the savings in inspection cost: it does not take into account any other of
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the potential benefits of the technology, such as the decrease in the risk associated with manual inspection and the cost
avoided by being able to spot problems earlier. In addition, it does not consider the added benefit from utilising the
technology for other tasks, for example as part of a blade repair system and transportation of small parts. Those benefits will
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need to be studied further to understand the wider effect of drone-enabled services for offshore wind.

0.20%
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Reduction on LCOE over the baseline

0.15%
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0.10%

0.05%

0.00%
(i) (ii) (iii)

Figure 13: Reduction in Levelised Cost of Electricity for offshore wind energy resulting from the introduction of drone visual inspection
when using drone service providers.

5. CONCLUSION

A transparent, comprehensive semi-empirical model for predicting the Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE) from
offshore wind has been developed for the purposes of evaluating the impact of novel drone-based inspection strategies. The
model is transparent in that it uses publicly available data sources and clearly defined analytical methods based on
engineering physics and economics. It is comprehensive in that it allows meaningful analysis of the relative impact of
changes in inspection strategy on overall costs. The model has been shown to be broadly valid in that it predicts LCOE for
offshore wind in line with present industry Contracts-for-Difference bids based on currently available data.

16
 The cost of traditional manual inspection of turbines using rope access is estimated to account for 0.7% of the wind farm
operational expenditure and around 0.2% of the LCOE. Replacing manual inspection with remotely piloted drones reduces
inspection costs by 70% and could decrease revenue lost during inspection by 90% due to reduced downtime. Increasing
autonomy of drone operations increases the speed at which inspections can be performed but introduces additional costs in
terms of complexity and compliance with regulations. As such, there is currently marginal economic benefit (2% reduction
in inspection costs) in moving towards the envisaged end goal of fully autonomous operations with a drone fleet
commanded by single remote supervision.

Drone inspection has been considered as both an in-house capability of an existing wind farm maintenance team and as a
service provided by a dedicated drone operator. It is shown that fully autonomous operations allow much greater business
scalability for drone service provides based on much higher fleet utilisation. Hence, it is likely that the drones as a service
inspection model will predominate as the technologies and legislation to support fully autonomous operations mature.

Acknowledgements
The work presented is supported by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) HOME-
Offshore project (EPSRC Reference: EP/P009743/1)

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HIGHLIGHTS
• A new cost model for predicting the Levelised Cost of Electricity from offshore wind
• Model informs wind farm operators on the costs of drone inspection techniques
• Model informs Drone Service Providers on the cost of higher levels of autonomy
• Greatest cost benefit comes from changing ropes to drones for visual inspection
• High levels of autonomy offer marginal benefit and is currently not worth pursuing

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