The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

Allen Hall, Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxum & Phil Totaro
The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

Uptime is a renewable energy podcast focused on wind energy and energy storage technologies. Experts Allen Hall, Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxum, and Phil Totaro break down the latest research, tech, and policy.

  1. GE Cypress Blade Tip Swap-out, Vestas Load Probability Control Method

    1 DAY AGO

    GE Cypress Blade Tip Swap-out, Vestas Load Probability Control Method

    This week on Uptime Power-Up, a method from Vestas for modifying control of a wind turbine using load probability, a blade tip swap-out for Cypress turbines from GE, and a wind turbine tower with solar panels installed. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Allen Hall: Welcome to Power Up, the Uptime podcast focused on the new, hot off the press technology that can change the world. Follow along with me, Alan Hall, and idasaur's Phil Totaro, as we discuss the weird, the wild, and the game changing ideas that will charge your energy future. Well, our first idea is from Vestas, and it is an idea where they're monitoring the Turbine tower loads for natural vibration frequency, and you say, well, why would you want to do that? Well, of course, as things change on a wind turbine, maybe something goes wrong. Those frequencies of vibration are going to change, and the system will detect those and say, hey, something is wrong. Here's probably what it is, which is a smart way of detecting failure modes in the turbine fill. But the other thing it could do, is push the turbine harder if it's not being driven hard enough and creating enough power. Philip Totaro: Yeah, and this is actually really fascinating because, again, this might not sound like the world's most revolutionary, innovation, but it's a practical solution to a challenge that is faced out there in the field when you're operating a wind farm. And specifically, in addition to just monitoring the, the tower loads and vibration over time, they have the option to monitor the max extreme load in relation to the original design load limit and readjust that max extreme load value over time as there's an evolution of the, the. Mechanical performance of, of the turbine. And that to me is, is really clever way of approaching this challenge of having additional safety factor. Or as we see in the United States where turbines get run a lot harder. Than they were potentially designed for. Sometimes because companies are trying to maximize their production tax, credit revenue. This is a way for a company like Vestus to keep an eye on whether or not they're exceeding a. Safety criteria, or by how much are you exceeding a safety criteria of,

    12 min
  2. 2 DAYS AGO

    Suzlon’s Record Quarter, Wind O&M Australia, Critical Minerals in US

    This week, Allen Hall and Joel Saxum explore Suzlon Energy's record-breaking quarter, featuring a 5.1 GW order book and 96% earnings increase. They detail plans for the Wind Energy O&M Australia conference in Melbourne, aimed at sharing global technical expertise. Allen and Joel discuss the game-changing discovery of America's largest lithium deposit in Arkansas, and spotlight Michigan's Isabella Wind Farm project, which powers major automotive companies while generating substantial community benefits. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Allen Hall: Well, Joel, we just don't seem to have the luck of some people, I'm telling you. Because a gentleman down in North Carolina found a 20 bill laying on the ground outside of a gas station and used it to buy, of all things, a scratch off lottery ticket. And that ticket was worth one million dollars. Joel Saxum: You know, Allen, sometimes they say, you gotta play to win. And if someone, if some, by some luck of chance, you get 20 and it's not, you're playing with the house's money, then. I think that, uh, maybe we need to just keep our heads on the ground a little bit more. Allen Hall: He had the opportunity to buy all kinds of lottery tickets. I don't know if you go into a gas station in North Carolina, there's several kinds there. He couldn't find the one that he wanted. So he ended up buying just one that seemed okay. And that was the winning one. So if he had chosen the ticket that they had, the ticket that he wanted, he wouldn't be a million dollars richer. Now, the real funny thing about this is they asked this gentleman, well, what are you going to do with all that money? And it says, we are going to head straight to Golden Corral and eat everything they've got. So he's gonna spend like 40 bucks worth of it? It's hard to spend a million dollars at Golden Corral. But, however, I, it did force me to take a look at the dessert menu. Cause that's one thing about Golden Corral is that they have a lot of desserts. It's like, it's a big dessert bar thing. And If you, I will read some of these to you and go, wow, okay, this is not bad, right? Chocolate dip marshmallow skewers.

    40 min
  3. DOF Acquires Maersk, Brookfield Invests in UK Offshore

    3 DAYS AGO

    DOF Acquires Maersk, Brookfield Invests in UK Offshore

    This week on News Flash, Allen, Joel and Phil discuss DOF Group's acquisition of Maersk Supply Service, TotalEnergies' growth in the renewables market, and Brookfield's acquisition of minority stake in four offshore wind farms owned by Ørsted. Welcome to Uptime News Flash. Industry news lightning fast. Your hosts, Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, and Phil Totaro discuss the latest deals, mergers, and alliances that will shape the future of wind power. News Flash is brought to you by IntelStor. For market intelligence that generates revenue, visit www.intelstor.com. Allen Hall: Joel, Norwegian offshore supply vessel company Dof Group has completed the acquisition of Denmark based Maersk Supply Service, which will be renamed Dof Denmark. The deal expands Dof's fleet to 78 modern offshore and subsea vessels, including 65 owned vessels, with the addition of Maersk Supply Service's 22 vessels. The combined company now has a workforce of more than 5, 000 employees and will continue offering integrated offshore services for both oil and gas and the growing offshore wind market. So you're seeing big players here, Joel, in offshore wind support. This is one of them. Joel Saxum: Yeah. From my past in offshore oil and gas, DOF is, they're in on every contract, right? They're a big company. They do things well and they do it right. Norwegians in the offshore world, you're always, you always look at them like the cream of the crop. Whenever they show up on site, they're expensive. And there's some specialists sometimes. But they are, they're always getting things done correctly. That's why people value them no matter where you are in the world. And DoF is a country, or a company, that values them. Full of all Norwegians. So, them grabbing Maersk, of course. The Norway Denmark connection of cousins or depending on which side you're talking to. Little brother, big brother. It's a, it's an easy tie up. Maersk, of course. A fantastic company with a lot of assets running all over the world. But also looking to you never know what they're going to do with this capital. Diversify a little bit try some other things. So Dof grabbing Maersk makes absolute sense to me. And if it was one company that would be buying some big chunks of Maersk assets as in Maersk supply service, Dof would be the one. Allen Hall: Total Energies has reported significant growth in its renewable energy operations for Q3 of 2024 with total power production reaching 29. 7 terawatt hours. Up 17 percent year over year. The company's renewable power production increased by 45 percent to 19. 6 terawatt hours with net power generation capacity up 36 percent to 21. 6 gigawatts. Total energies reached a gross renewable capacity of 24. 2 gigawatts with solar dominating at 15. 6 gigawatts followed by onshore wind. At 5. 9 gigawatts. Phil, Total Energy is just becoming a huge player in renewables and the growth in the Q3 is amazing. Philip Totaro: Yeah, and what's really fascinating is that with all the other oil and gas companies pulling away and pulling back from Investments in renewables totals remained committed to it and has always been one of the bigger, oil and gas and utility companies in Europe besides maybe, stack craft event fall to, well, you could say Orsted maybe but, they, they've remained committed to a renewables portfolio and have, based on their presence in the utility business around the world even in, as far foreign places as, as some of the Asia Pacific islands they've, they've had and own and operate renewable assets for, for more than a decade, going on, 15, almost 20 years at this point. So it's, it's good to see that they're.

    8 min
  4. R&D Test Systems Builds Massive 25 MW Main Bearing Test Facility

    NOV 7

    R&D Test Systems Builds Massive 25 MW Main Bearing Test Facility

    In this episode, Peter Winther, Key Account Manager at R&D Test Systems, discusses the construction of the world's most powerful main bearing test facility at the Lindø Offshore Renewable Center in Denmark. Winther provides fascinating insights into the engineering challenges and scale of this groundbreaking 25-megawatt facility, including details about its massive concrete foundation and the specialized testing capabilities designed to simulate decades of wear in just months. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Welcome to Uptime Spotlight, shining light on wind energy's brightest innovators. This is the Progress Powering Tomorrow. Allen Hall: Today we're joined by Peter Winther, Key Account Manager at R& D Test Systems, a company that's revolutionizing how we test wind turbine components. R& D Test Systems is currently building the world's most powerful main bearing test facility at the Lindo Offshore Renewable Center in Denmark. They have already delivered the largest halt test bench for nacelle testing at the same location and now these facilities are pushing the boundaries of what's possible in wind turbine testing with capabilities up to 25 megawatts. Peter brings extensive experience in large scale test system development and has been instrumental in multiple groundbreaking projects at LORC. Peter, welcome to the show. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. All right, so you're building a 25 megawatt main bearing test system. Facility. That's big. That's very big. So just give it a sense of scale. How big is a 25 megawatt bearing? Peter Winther: The bearing itself, I would guess the inside diameter is more than four meters in a typical bearing constellation. The test bench on the other high, on the other side is also relatively big to be able to break that bearing or bearings, depending on what you're testing. The test bench itself pretty big. First of all, features a pretty decent size concrete block or foundation at the bottom, which is roundabout 35 meters long. It took 30 hours to cast the whole thing. It was a one continuous process. We had 280 trucks coming in and they were coming in every six minu...

    21 min
  5. Siemens Gamesa Blade Closeout Plates, Vestas & ZF Plastic Torque Tube

    NOV 6

    Siemens Gamesa Blade Closeout Plates, Vestas & ZF Plastic Torque Tube

    This week on Power-Up, we discuss Siemens Gamesa's method for stabilizing wind turbine blades by installing closeout plates. Then Vestas and ZF's idea to replace the metal torque tube in the gearbox with a plastic piece, protecting from current. And finally, an Enercon patent for painting blades in an ombre pattern to lessen visual disturbances. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Allen Hall: Welcome to Power Up, the uptime podcast focused on the new, hot off the press technology that can change the world. Follow along with me, Allen Hall, and IntelStor's Phil Totaro, as we discuss the weird, the wild, and the game changing ideas that will charge your energy future. All right guys, our first idea is what's turbine blades, and it's an idea from Siemens Gamesa, and it In patent form, as they describe it here, it's what they call a novel approach to stabilizing wind turbine blades without the need for traditional trailing edge beam designs. But what they're really doing is they're installing closeout plates on the, between the aft spar and the trailing edge. So, This idea is pretty much making a wind turbine blade look a lot like an airplane wing, Phil. Philip Totaro: Yeah, especially like an older style airplane wing. So those that aren't familiar with the closeout plate, it's like a rib design that has this, vertical element at different longitudinal locations throughout the Kind of the, the max cord section and in inner portion with the exception of like the, the immediate root section of the blade. But it's, it's interesting to me, besides just the, the general concept here, the timing of this was fascinating to me because they filed for this patent back in April of 2024. And the patent has now published in October and the question Is, is this a potential fix to a problem? Is this what's this really doing? Allen Hall: Well, it's stopping torsion is what it's doing, Phil. It's preventing the blade from twisting too much, which makes me think of a couple of blades that I'm familiar with that have torsion problems. Joel? Joel Saxum: Well, if you look at the image here, so I've crawled around in quite a few blades doing RCA's and failures, and you're always looking for failure modes,

    11 min
  6. NOV 5

    Why Are Australian Wind Farms Losing Money?

    In this episode, Allen, Joel, Phil and Rosemary analyze why 38% of Australian wind farms are struggling with profitability despite stable PPAs. They explore how solar saturation, coal plant inflexibility, and maintenance contract structures impact returns. Plus, the team examines BlueFloat Energy's withdrawal from New Zealand and what recent auction results in Maine reveal about the broader challenges facing floating offshore wind development. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Allen Hall: It is almost fall. I guess it is fall. Joel Saxum: It's almost November. Allen Hall: I was just outside today. It was like 70 degrees outside. It felt like the end of summer, not the beginning of fall. But we're almost in winter. We got another month or two before we hit the official start of winter, which means all the bears up in my area are starting to thinking about hibernating. But in the meantime, they're usually pretty hungry, trying to fatten up before the winter really hits. And This causes a lot of problems if you're around bears, and a lady in Montana had a problem where she went out to work in her pickup truck early in the morning and realized that it had been all torn apart by a black bear, of all things, which is the thing that I worry about the most around here. At this time of year, when you're bringing in things from the house, and a bear shows up and says, Oh, there's groceries in the car, hops in, and then panics, which is what happened to this lady. The bear panics and just destroys the vehicle. And this has happened very close to us, actually. And not that long ago, it was this summer, where bears were walking in our driveway, walked right by my wife, she didn't even know it was there. So it's serious that don't leave your car doors open. That's the one thing I remember in the fall. Don't leave your car doors open for any length of time. Otherwise, when you go back, you may have befriended a bear. Philip Totaro: Allen, I've seen videos where they're opening car doors. So don't even think about, you can close the door and they're still gonna get in. So I don't know, man. They're getting sophisticated out there. Joel Saxum: I've got another tip for you from my chil...

    49 min
  7. Avangrid Sells Kitty Hawk North, Saudi Arabia Localizes Towers

    NOV 4

    Avangrid Sells Kitty Hawk North, Saudi Arabia Localizes Towers

    This week on Uptime News Flash, Avangrid sells the Kitty Hawk North lease area to Dominion Energy. In Saudia Arabia, the government signed two major localization agreements for wind energy steel towers. And Enerjisa Üretim has secured a major 1 billion 10 year term loan for the development of the YEKA 2 wind power plant. Welcome to Uptime News Flash. Industry news lightning fast. Your hosts, Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, and Phil Totaro discuss the latest deals, mergers, and alliances that will shape the future of wind power. News Flash is brought to you by Intelstor. For market intelligence that generates revenue, visit www.intelstor.com. Allen Hall: Well, Phil, Saudi Arabia has taken a significant step forward in its wind energy sector with the signing of two major localization agreements for wind energy steel towers. The agreements were signed by the Kingdom's Local Content and Government Procurement Authority with Al Yamama Steel Industries and Arabian International Company for Steel Structures. These deals are part of a large initiative that saw 107 agreements and memorandums of understanding signed during the Energy Localization Forum in Riyadh, valued at approximately 27 billion. I didn't realize there was that much money in steel towers, Phil, but wow. These agreements are impressive. Philip Totaro: Yeah, that that's for all agreements that they sign, not just the steel tower ones to, to clarify for everybody. But the, the interesting tidbit with this is the fact that, they obviously have a couple of, wind farms now in Saudi Arabia, one that's operational, one under construction, as well as a demo turbine from GE from, from a few years back. And they're, they're at a point where they're really looking at the future of renewable energy for themselves in, in their domestic market so that they can, have more control over, how much oil they export and, and where they export it to moving forward. So this gives them another knob to turn if they can use this renewable power for the power generation. Industry instead of leveraging their own oil abundant though it may be, they all recognize that there's a finite amount. So this is part of their efforts at domestication of part of the industry that they see as, as being an important element for them moving forward. So much so that their public investment fund has, has, Also made moves in the past to, put money behind renewable ventures in in Europe and Asia and even looking at the United States as well. So, this is them taking a step forward in terms of their renewable energy market. Joel Saxum: Yeah, Saudi Arabia keeps on basically reinventing itself and, and morphing into something that it wasn't in the past, which is very interesting. I, for one, I follow the, the Neom project very closely because it's really interesting to me. So they're spending a lot of money. I mean, they even went as far as to lure a lot of the PGA players away for their own golf league. And now they're setting up with Dana White from the UFC, they're setting up their own boxing league. So they're doing a lot of things. They're taking advantage of, of course, the money they have now to try and build what their economy is for the future. And, they have been a classically oil and gas economy. And, and that's where a lot of their sovereign wealth comes from. So they have the capabilities to make large structures and invest in, in, in industry. So going to steel towers for wind makes absolute sense for them. Allen Hall: Avangrid has successfully closed the sale of its Kitty Hawk North offshore wind lease area to Dominion Energy.

    9 min
  8. Stopping the Data Chaos: The Million-Dollar Challenge SkySpecs is Solving

    OCT 31

    Stopping the Data Chaos: The Million-Dollar Challenge SkySpecs is Solving

    In this episode, Allen and Joel speak with Tom Brady, CTO of SkySpecs, to discuss the challenges and solutions in managing multiple data sources in wind farm operations. Brady explores how SkySpecs is revolutionizing wind turbine maintenance through integrated data analytics, advanced drone technology, and AI-driven decision-making tools, while sharing a glimpse into exciting R&D developments that promise to transform the industry's approach to predictive maintenance. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.comWind Energy O&M Australia Conference - https://www.windaustralia.com Welcome to Uptime Spotlight. Shining light on wind energy's brightest innovators. This is the progress powering tomorrow. Allen Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I'm your host, Allen Hall, along with my co host, Joel Saxum. We're going to discuss a challenge that's becoming increasingly critical in our data driven world, managing and integrating data from multiple sources in wind farm operations. In the age of smart turbines and lot sensors, wind farm operators are awash in data. But here's the catch. According to a recent industry survey, a staggering 54 percent of operators find managing multiple data sources to be difficult or very difficult. It's like trying to conduct an orchestra where every instrument is playing from a different sheet of music. In today's episode, we'll be diving into this data dilemma. We'll explore why integrating data from various sources is so challenging, how it impacts decision making and operational efficiency, And, most importantly, what innovative solutions are emerging to tackle this issue. But that's not all. We are also pulling back the curtain on some exciting R& D projects at SkySpecs that promise to revolutionize how we handle data in the wind energy sectors. From advanced analytics to machine learning, we'll get a glimpse of the future of wind farm data management. Our guest is Tom Brady, the CTO at SkySpecs. And Tom leads the technology vision and development at SkySpecs, overseeing the creation of innovative solutions for the wind energy industry. His expertise in managing complex data systems and R& D initiatives is crucial to addressing the challenges of multi source data management in wind farms...

    26 min
4.8
out of 5
40 Ratings

About

Uptime is a renewable energy podcast focused on wind energy and energy storage technologies. Experts Allen Hall, Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxum, and Phil Totaro break down the latest research, tech, and policy.

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