AI exposure: Wind Turbine Service Technicians
Inspect, diagnose, adjust, or repair wind turbines. Perform maintenance on wind turbine equipment including resolving electrical, mechanical, and hydraulic malfunctions.
Reading this score
computedAt 10.5% of weighted task load, Wind Turbine Service Technicians sits at the 15th percentile, below the point where a job's centre of gravity has moved. 80.0% of what this role does is untouched, meaning current systems cannot produce that work at all, whatever the commercial incentive.
What holds the line here is embodiment. Across this occupation's 12 tasks it averages 2.71 out of 3, the highest of the five friction dimensions. In plain terms, the work has to happen in physical space. A language model cannot move matter. Until the robotics to do this work is both good enough and cheap enough to deploy widely, capability in software does not reach it.
The most exposed thing this job does is Maintain tool and spare parts inventories required for repair, installation, or replacement..., at 30.0%. The least is Assist in assembly of individual wind generators or construction of wind farms, at 0.0%. A gap of 30.0% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within installation, maintenance and repair occupations, this one is less exposed than the median of 13.8% across the group's 50 roles, with 32 scoring higher. Being in an exposed family does not make a particular job exposed, and the reverse holds too.
What would move this score. Of 12 tasks, 2 are currently banded exposed, 0 assisted and 10 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take robotics cheap and reliable enough to deploy at scale, not a better language model. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 0.79 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 2.71 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 0.62 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 1.25 | 0-3 |
| Context | 1.33 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 1.46 | 0-3 |
Task by task
12 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maintain tool and spare parts inventories required for repair, installation, or replacement services. | 30.0% | 20.0% | 50.0% | 4.13 | exposed |
| Train end-users, distributors, installers, or other technicians in wind commissioning, testing, or other technical procedures. | 28.3% | 21.7% | 50.0% | 3.83 | exposed |
| Start or restart wind turbine generator systems to ensure proper operations. | 15.0% | 10.0% | 75.0% | 4.50 | untouched |
| Collect turbine data for testing or research and analysis. | 15.0% | 10.0% | 75.0% | 3.83 | untouched |
| Test structures, controls, or mechanical, hydraulic, or electrical systems, according to test plans or in coordination with engineers. | 12.5% | 12.5% | 75.0% | 4.12 | untouched |
| Troubleshoot or repair mechanical, hydraulic, or electrical malfunctions related to variable pitch systems, variable speed control systems, converter systems, or related components. | 10.0% | 15.0% | 75.0% | 4.74 | untouched |
| Test electrical components of wind systems with devices, such as voltage testers, multimeters, oscilloscopes, infrared testers, or fiber optic equipment. | 10.0% | 15.0% | 75.0% | 4.55 | untouched |
| Inspect or repair fiberglass turbine blades. | 4.6% | 7.9% | 87.5% | 3.47 | untouched |
| Perform routine maintenance on wind turbine equipment, underground transmission systems, wind fields substations, or fiber optic sensing and control systems. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.60 | untouched |
| Diagnose problems involving wind turbine generators or control systems. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.57 | untouched |
| Climb wind turbine towers to inspect, maintain, or repair equipment. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.48 | untouched |
| Assist in assembly of individual wind generators or construction of wind farms. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.11 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.
What this means in practice
Most of this work is not reachable by current systems, so the immediate pressure is on the administrative edges of the role rather than its core: the scheduling, the reporting, the written records. That is where time is recovered.