Seismic effects on onshore wind turbines: A critical engineering perspective for resilience and disaster risk reduction

This article delivers a review of seismic effects on Wind Turbine Generators (WTGs), framing the discussion within a multi-hazard context where wind and earthquake actions interact over a turbine. Drawing on more than one hundred and fifty experimental and numerical investigations, it synthesises current understanding of aerodynamic–seismic load combinations, damping contributions, soil–structure interaction phenomena, and documented failure cases. Time-domain simulations and shake-table tests reveal that near-fault pulses aligned with fundamental tower modes can drive base moments and tower-top displacements well beyond wind-governed capacities, particularly when soft soils lengthen natural periods and amplify ground motion. Aerodynamic damping in the fore–aft direction mitigates seismic demand by up to 30% during operation, yet parked or idling states may experience ratios below 1%, exposing the structure to resonance. Field evidence of tower buckling at Kugino and foundation distress at Kashima in 2011 underscores the tangible consequences of overlooking seismic hazards. It concludes that future design provisions must integrate site-specific wind, seismic, and soil parameters within unified reliability-based criteria, and calls for large-scale field studies, refined near-fault ground-motion taxonomies, and adaptive control algorithms to unlock resilient deployment of WTGs in seismically challenging territories.