雷电对机组的影响已经暴露出来，日本经常会受到严重的雷击侵袭。而最有名的的应该是日本沿海地区独有的冬季雷暴。实际上，在日本的沿海的风力发电场每年都受到严重的雷电影响，同时由于日本冬季雷的电流强度高于世界平均雷电流强度，所以其威力和破坏力也是巨大的。

　　尽管按照相关的标准采取了一定的防护措施，但在对于叶片而言仍没有更好的防护手段，当雷电击中机组后雷电流的传导还存在很多不确定性。

　　所以说在风力发电雷电防护领域还有很多的工作需要进一步完善，一般来讲，机组的防雷系统包括：机舱接闪器（测风支架）、叶片接闪器、由于机舱上接闪器的高度和角度不能满足防护需要，单独设计避雷塔的费用也较高；尽管叶片上配置有接闪器，也被IEC61400-24这一技术属性文件明确提出，并作为一种通用方案，但是这并不是最完整有效的防护方法。无论叶片上是否有设计接闪器，对于机组的变桨、主控、发电机、变压器等低压电控设备的雷击事故依然发生。IEC的一篇技术性文章指出：雷电对机组的影响主要集中在低压电控系统和通信系统，一般来说只要机组中存在低压电子类装置，在雷电发生时，低压电控设备都是受到雷电电磁脉冲的影响及直接在线路上产生的浪涌的侵袭。

　　考虑到机组的特殊情况，作者提出了一种利用两个环形电极构成的间隙放电器组成的直击雷防护系统，这种系统最担心的问题是如何保证雷电流不进入轮毂及机舱，这部分在文中将作为重点讨论。通过一个比例尺为1:100参照实际的2MW风力发电机组制作一个模型，并采用这种防雷系统，通过雷击实验的方式验证这套系统的有效性和优势。

　　2.ProposaloftheNovelLightningProtectionSystem

Figure 1 is a conceptual illustration of a conventional system and the proposed system of lightning protection for wind turbines. Generally, in the conventional system,the lightning current flows from one of the receptors installed on the top end of a blade to the ground via a down-conductor in the blade, brush or arc-horn near the bearing, and a grounding-wire (or sometimes the body of the tower itself).
The surge current flow inside the tower may create a large inductive current in low-voltage circuits such as control, measurement and communication devices. Thus, the conventional grounding system is potentially weak for the protection of low-voltage circuits inside the wind turbine. By contrast, the proposed system has two ring-shaped electrodes of several meters diameter, one of which is vertically attached to the nose cone and the other laterally placed on top of the wind tower lying just below the nacelle.
 The pair of rings is arranged with a narrow gap of no more than 1 m to avoid mechanical friction during rotation of the blades and the nacelle’s circling. When lightning (here, suppose the current is positive)strikes a blade, the lightning current reaches the upper ring from a receptor through a conductive wire installed on the blade.
Then, the electric field between the two rings becomes high and finally sparks over and the lightning current flows downwards. The current propagates along the lower ring and grounding wire,which is arranged outside the wind tower rather than inside, and is safely led to a grounding electrode sited far enough away from the grounding for the tower.

　　2.新型雷电防护系统的提出