Report Shows Wind Turbines Are The Biggest Driver of Offshore Claims

Wind turbines are the largest driver of offshore loss claims, representing 57% of claims by count, according to a new report.

AXIS Capital released an offshore wind report, an analysis of four years of claims trends across its international portfolio of construction and operational claims.

Roughly two-thirds of turbine-related claims stemmed from damage to drive train components including generators, gearboxes and main bearings. Inter-array cables represented 14% of the claim count with an average of $6.8 million per average claim.

Wind turbine foundation claims represented the third largest driver of claims (8%) with an average of $7.4 million with losses linked to pile running, pile rejection and seabed-related installation challenges.

“Although turbine-related claims have increased in frequency in recent years, inter array and export cables remain a major source of high-severity claims, with export cables having the highest average claim cost ($18.8M) in our dataset,” the report states.

Blade damage had 16% of the total claim count with an average cost of roughly $1.5 million. Gearbox ($2.1 million) and generator ($1.9 million) claims are growing in claims count each year, the report shows.

“Having analyzed hundreds of offshore wind claims over a four-year period, the findings depict an industry navigating complex technical risk at all stages of a project’s life, irrespective of geographical location,” the report states. “The industry has also learned valuable lessons and developed solutions to mitigate risk, such as the additional stabilization of wind farm export and inter-array cables.”