Published

1 year ago

January 11, 2025

Alice Rush

From the surge in lightning strikes damaging wind turbines to the game-changing potential of nacelle-based LiDAR systems, Lars Bendsen of AC883 shares insights on wind farm maintenance. Lars describes how LiDAR installations can boost power output by 3.5%, and warns how ignoring simple pitch alignment issues leads to catastrophic turbine failures.

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Lars Bendsen: 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 Spotlight. I’m your host, Allen Hall. Today, we’re diving into the costly challenges plaguing wind farms with Lars Bendsen from AC883. From a surge in severe lightning strikes to devastating turbine misalignments, Lars reveals why seemingly minor issues can lead to catastrophic failures, and how cutting edge solutions like nacelle based lidars are transforming maintenance strategies.

Plus, discover why Lars believes too many industry tourists are making decisions that cost operators millions in unnecessary repairs. So get ready for a no holds bar discussion about what’s really happening in wind farm maintenance. Lars, welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast Spotlight. Thank you so much.

Appreciate it. Well, you’ve had a busy blade season and you’ve had crews all over Canada and parts of the U S what kind of problems were you solving with your blade crews this year?

Lars Bendsen: That was, that was a crazy repair season. Um, and it’s not to feed directly into, but it, we had a ton of lightning strikes and lightning repairs higher than I would say the average.

And some of the strikes were severe. So I don’t know, uh, you probably know better than me if the weather pattern has been leading up to better or worse. Um, what we do know, we had a really, um, wet summer. We had a ton of weather delays. We had a ton of high winds. We have a ton of rain. Uh, so we had our, our standby time, time was, was higher than usual.

And it’s annoying for everybody involved. Owners don’t get their job done and money is flying out the window. So. And we don’t get the job done either. So, so, so it’s really wet that way. So I don’t know if that’s the aftermath was going on over the winter. I have no idea because you can’t really see when this like was there.

Uh, and, and the owners, the owners have a system that can measure when it comes. But. I don’t think they’re looking at it.

Allen Hall: That’s, that’s true. Uh, we are seeing more lightning strike damage over this past summer. It’s been really bad. I, I think it’s just the, the set of storms that came through. But in, in your case with AC 8A3, when you have technicians on site, you’re bringing high quality sort of apprenticeship plus technicians that have a lot of training so that when you get into these complicated repairs, you can actually accomplish them properly.

Lars Bendsen: We are, we are getting our people from mostly from Europe, uh, simply because there’s no cable, there’s, there’s no, uh, availability for, for staff in Canada. Uh, so we get them in from Europe on a proper work permit, simply because we are short staffed. Uh, we do pay more. We also get, uh, GWO certified technicians, all of them.

And, um, last year we had about 60 percent that could do. Cat 4, Cat 5. Next year they’re all doing Cat 4 and Cat 5. That means on some simple LEP work we could maybe be either be earning less. Or we might be a little more expensive on regular LEP work because it is highly trained technicians. Uh, we learned from last year based on the percentage of Cat 4 and Cat 5 damages.

We simply need to have more flexibility so we won’t, we will only have Cat 4 and Cat 5 technicians.

Allen Hall: Do you think there’s more Cat 4, Cat 5 damage lately? Because that’s what I think. I’ve seen a lot more

Lars Bendsen: over the last couple years. From, uh, from, uh, 23 to 24 there’s a significant increase. Uh, if it’s really high, uh, lightning strikes, uh, damages from tailed headspin, everything.

Allen Hall: Yeah. Is that driven by just the lack of understanding that what looks like to be maybe a small pinhole in a blade is really much larger and the operators don’t catch it early enough or is there other factors involved there?

Lars Bendsen: I don’t know. I think it might be that, um, I mean, everybody knows that all the engineering departments are all owners.

are really lean or in best case lean, but mostly understaffed. So that means the poor guys, they are struggling to keep up with everything. They can’t see it. And, um, and, uh, I have, I have a strong, I think I have a strong opinion about the drone inspection all the time, because the AI and the pictures, it’s, it, you cannot run an autopilot.

You cannot just take a picture, see that’s it. You can’t, you simply have to get up there. We had minimum Minimum of 10 blades were simply just a grease spot that was categorized as Category 4. We also had the opposite, where just a grease spot was actually a lightning strike. So we had it, we had it all over the place, so you cannot, you cannot run an autopilot.

Allen Hall: That’s interesting because I, I’ve heard that same discussion from a couple of operators about whether the drone inspection categorization has been correct. But I think as the lightning strikes, uh get more frequent. We’re seeing what looks to be smaller damage further down the blade, which would typically be grease.

If you, especially as you get closer to the root of a blade, you always think, well, that’s grease from inside the nacelle that’s fallen onto the blade. Don’t worry about it. But in reality, I think we’re seeing more lightning strike damage in more critical areas that lead to this cat four and cat five issues.

Lars Bendsen: Well, uh, you’ve seen it very often as well. It’s a small lightning strike. Once you start opening it up, then you are 16 layer deep. Just an example, right? So we had some of them that looked very small and then you’re ending up in a 78, 000, 100, 000 bill, right? Even though it looks very small and therefore, yeah, good.

No, I’m just saying, that’s why I don’t, I personally, I know it has a ton of opinion about it, but I personally don’t think you can run on autopilot, which also go back to the, you know, we’ve been involved in robotics as well, robotic repair and all that jazz, and I know there’s a place in the market for it.

Absolutely. But based on our experience, pure LEP and nothing else is only having, might be 10 percent of the blades. There’s always something to look for. There’s always an extra damage. There’s always something. So we have to get up there anyhow.

Allen Hall: Is that because the industry for the longest time has only inspected like a third of the farm at a time.

So it’d take three years to really get across the whole site. So if you did have damage. It may have sat there for two years before anybody even could identify it. Isn’t that changing a little bit though, that meeting operators that are doing a lot more inspection and trying to catch these ideas, you know, these problems early?

Lars Bendsen: No, and I, I agree. And I, I agree. And during the drone inspection, do drew your whole fleet every year? Just do it. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, uh, it’s peanuts compared to whatever, but on that said, I think it’s great with drone inspection, but you cannot rely on a hundred percent outer pilot. Somebody has to look at it.

With qualified eye to look at it. And it’s better to climb one, one blade. Too many than one, too less, too little, so.

Allen Hall: So the question in my mind when it comes to lightning damage up in Canada is because it’s so cold and there’s so much freeze thaw that happens. As part of the issue that once you have this wound in a blade that just the freeze thaw over a year or two can really expand it and then cause trailing edge separation and all those sort of horrible things that happen to blades?

Lars Bendsen: Well, I guess as soon as you get more intrusions, uh Uh, then of course, uh, up here, uh, water had a chance to get stiff under zero degrees C. So, uh, so of course then you have a, uh, have an issue.

Allen Hall: That leads into the discussion about, well, it’s cold in Canada, which means you guys get the winter first and then it comes down our way, uh, because we’re getting close.

Which then gets me into, it’s pitch alignment and sort of yaw alignment season for you. Because it’s nice to have the fields sort of knocked down and everything frozen. Pitch alignment is a huge problem and what balancing is a huge problem too. What are you seeing out in the field right now?

Lars Bendsen: Well, I’m seeing that owners relying on OEM statements that we can, we can do a.

We can do pitch correction without control, we can do x factor, we can do automatic, uh, yaw alignment, which is, um, which is questionable, when put it that way. And, um, I said, uh, my new word is, uh, there are so many tourists in this, in this industry. They’re tourists. They simply don’t know what they’re talking about.

They come and look at it. It looks nice, but they actually don’t know what they’re talking about. A yaw alignment is one thing, but say we can correct your yaw alignment. No, you can’t, because you can static align your turbine. But turbines are misaligned differently in different wind bins. So you need a dynamic alignment.

Yaw alignment, not a static yaw alignment. And the only thing you can do is static, you cannot do any dynamic yaw alignment. Um, very simple, uh, just to give you a, just a brief, I mean the, the, the equipment sitting behind the rotor, that means the, the anemometer, uh, cup anemometer, sensor, whatever you have, is sitting behind the rotor.

That means it’s sitting in turbulent, in turbulent wind. And it’s always chasing whatever has happened already. They get the information later and then try to chase the wind. Uh, there are some OEMs that don’t, because also you cannot yaw yaw bearings and brakes, et cetera. So but there’s also some OEMs that they’re allowing up to 7.

9 degrees before they do anything. And then they have, you know, uh, when you boil an egg, you have a watch that’s starting and they have a counter for 30 seconds. If it stays above 8 for 30 seconds, they start yawing back towards zero. And that’s the better one of them, they’re doing that. So that’s the, that’s the dynamic yaw alignment that you need to have.

I have no, we have no stake in LIDARs per se. We know them, we work with them, but we don’t have any monetary stake in it. Uh, but you need a Nacelle based LIDAR, basically, if you want to run optimal. That means you’re measuring 80 meters in front of the turbine in a clean airstream, that you get a way more accurate.

Uh, well wind speed and, and wind direction measurement. And then you connect that to controller and then that control your yoing, your yours. You’re not changing any, your strategy. You’re still doing the same. You don’t overdo the yawing. You just wanna make sure that you have a more accurate read on speed and direction where scan feeds into your pits.

Allen Hall: Yeah. Let, let’s, let’s talk about lidars for a minute because, uh, I know you and I have had a couple of discussions about Lidars. I don’t see them used very much in the United States at the moment. Uh, because I don’t think people really understand them, of what the, how they can use them for operational purposes, I, I think they see them as sort of a calib, kind of a calibration issue, and then once they’re done, they’re kind of move on.

But you’re saying that the LiDAR can really improve your operational performance.

Lars Bendsen: Oh, absolutely. Uh, you have, of course, I think it’s misinterpretation because there’s only, basically only one supplier of nacelle based LiDARs. There’s a ton of ground based LiDARs. There’s measuring up and kind of measuring in a cone when you do site assessment.

And that’s totally good for that. But this is a nacelle based LiDAR. Two beam. They can also get into four beam so we can measure wind shear. But for operational purposes, it’s actually more to get the wind speed and wind direction more accurate. And that is connected to the controller. With a, it doesn’t matter which controller, and that means that will do your, uh, your alignment in each wind bin.

Allen Hall: Okay, so the LiDAR is acting as an alignment tool constantly to try to correct for what the OEM equipment didn’t

Lars Bendsen: do. It’s kind of a third party, uh, call it, uh, anemometer just measuring 80 meters out in front of the turbine. And it does, and it does more accurate because it is laser basically, right? Right.

Right. Right.

Allen Hall: The implementation of LIDAR on turbines is what? Does every turbine have a separate lidar, or is a LIDAR good for a couple of turbines around it?

Lars Bendsen: No, you do. You do it on every single turbine because you cannot remote control. You cannot remote connect to every turbine’s controller. We had to be connected to the, to the controller.

And it’s very simple. We do a two turbines a day, so it’s not a big thing to do. It takes a couple of hours to get it aligned, connect to the controller. It’s very simple, actually.

Allen Hall: What does that process look like? Because now you got me curious. I’m taking, I’m taking this LIDAR unit. I’m bringing it up tower.

I’m mounting it to the top of the nacelle. I’m maybe doing a little bit of alignment to get it. Focus in the right place. And then I’m plugging that into the SCADA system, the control system? In

Lars Bendsen: the

Allen Hall: controller

Lars Bendsen: itself.

Allen Hall: Oh, in the controller itself.

Lars Bendsen: Yeah, and it’s a failsafe system. It’s running on different bus connections.

It’s too technical, also for me. But it’s a failsafe system, so if something goes wrong with the LiDAR, or the LiDAR can’t see heavy fog or something like that, then it goes back on the controller. on their own original anemometer. So it’s not, there’s no danger to it. Um, right now we have huge success on, uh, V82 in the US and Canada.

Um, the V82 is a bit of a different animal because it’s a stall regulated turbine. Uh, but again, uh, I talked to a colleague of mine said, well, that guy should change the, uh, the algorithm. He was not, he was not working that day. So, uh, so, so it’s not, it’s not very accurate. It’s not. Uh, so that’s one thing.

So V82 specifically, and also an interesting is that when a V82 running above radio wind speed, it very often come up with an alarm and shuts down. Alarm 236 or whatever it’s called, the flap wise, so it simply shuts down in high wind because it’s running at over speed because it’s only stall regulated.

So, What we are doing is running down on a ton of vibrations, that’s why it stops. So, um, so we are misaligning the turbine on purpose above radio wind speed. Below we are running as close to zero as we can. But above rated wind speed, we are misaligning the turbine. That removes the, uh, the vibrations and we also have a less load on that turbine.

So we’re actually opposite what you normally would think.

Allen Hall: You can produce more power having a little bit of an offset because the turbine doesn’t shut down.

Lars Bendsen: And we have now on, um, we have of the more than 200 turbines we have outfitted in Canada and the U. S., we are seeing, uh, we’re seeing, say, AP gains of 2.

8 to 3. 5 percent AP. And that’s without the extra uptime. That is just because of AP power. That’s remarkable.

Allen Hall: Getting 1 percent today can be a lot, because the turbines are usually pretty good, but if you can squeeze out more than that, that’s remarkable. Where is the LiDAR generally used at? What kind of farms be interested in LIDAR.

Is it kind of ridgeline farms or the wind can be a little more unique or is it in the flat plains of Kansas and Oklahoma and Canada?

Lars Bendsen: Well, of course, the more, the more obstacles you have in front of your turbines, the worse it gets. Uh, I’ve seen down in Mojave Desert, actually, on, on, on the side down there, the turbines on the same side are basically 90 degrees.

Misaligned from each other, but they’re both right. They’re, they’re well aligned, but of course the wind is simply coming around like that. So it looks weird when you’re driving there. They’re 90 degrees different or they the same wind farm, but they’re both correct. Aligned.

Allen Hall: Yeah. I would say something is wrong.

Stop the turbine. But yeah,

Lars Bendsen: but no, they’re both right. . So, uh, but that’s, that is really, so that’s, that’s one thing I think is the critical, we talk about maintenance. The, uh, the, the, um, again, back to my old phrase that some of VM have bored. The rotor is the motor, and it means if the rotor is not aligned in pitch and yaw, mass imbalance, et cetera, then you’re paying for it.

Allen Hall: That makes a lot of sense then. So knowing more about the wind with LiDAR has a, what kind of ROI is that on a LiDAR system?

Lars Bendsen: Well, depending on, uh, what market you’re in on the AP or the PPA, of course, right? So, so that’s depending on, but, uh, but we have seen less than a year. We also seen, uh, depending on, uh, what you’re in, right?

What is your, uh, what is your, uh, your factor up to your capacity factor, your PP, et cetera, so it’s not a, it’s not a, uh, one size fits all we have to look at it and, and make smart decisions, right? Boy,

Allen Hall: any ROI less than a year, I want to get involved with.

Lars Bendsen: This will actually get fired for not doing it.

Allen Hall: Right. You should. That’s too easy. Yeah. It sounds interesting. So let’s, let’s bump into pitch alignment and unbalanced rotors, which are very prevalent. Joel and I were traveling across Kansas and Oklahoma and Texas quite a bit this year. It’s fairly easy to see rotors that are imbalanced or that they’re just not, you can tell because there’s a little bit of wobble going on there.

Yeah. And often you can hear it. You can hear it. Yes.

Lars Bendsen: So what is the solution for that? How do they fix it? Well, first of all, we have to measure if it’s imbalanced and, uh, if, if it’s, uh, if it’s aerodynamically balanced or not. That’s, that’s number one. Let’s figure that out. Do we have the same pitch angle?

Regardless of what it is, it has to be the same. And it has to be the same all the time. Actual pitch or not is to be the same. So, uh, and they’re not, um, based on, on our, we had done more than, I think we had 2, 500 turbines now in the US and Canada, and, um, based, based on age of the fleet and also the, the, the manufacturer, it’s, uh, it’s, it’s crazy And, and people, they know it, but they don’t do anything.

And that’s where back to what I said before, but we have too many tourists in our industry, so the decision making, right? So I’m just took my note here. Uh, we talking to, to, to an engineering department. They understand it. Engineering and no money. They just, they just have to nod. Yeah, it’s good. Passing it down to the site, site looks at it.

They think it’s a great idea too. Now they have to sell it to either director of operations or asset management. Some director of operations, they understand it. But if you have money now, we can’t put it on import because that’s already cut in. So it absolutely Zero fat on that bone. There’s no money left for anything, projects like that.

And then sometimes we go to the as a manager, which might be often, or sometimes it’s a commercial, or you’re the person, less technical. And that’s where, that’s where the tourists come in because they simply don’t know technically enough about it.

Allen Hall: Well with an unbalanced rotor, It’s an almost inevitable.

You’re going to destroy a main bearing set. You’re going to probably take down a gearbox with it if you let it go on long enough. And in some of these cases that I’ve heard, the control cabinets are moving around so much that they’re damaging the control cabinets. At what point do you say it’s worth, I can’t replace control cabinets anymore, I’m just going to do a pitch alignment and be done with it.

It seems like an obvious choice.

Lars Bendsen: Sometimes what we have seen on, especially hydraulic pits, that it’s not as bad as you think, it’s way worse. So, um, we have had a customer change the cabinets. Three or four times a year. And they don’t know what it is. They just have vibrations. So now they buy vibration sensors.

Now they’re looking at extra bearings for the gearbox. Now they look at all kinds of stuff without looking at the front of your rotor. Look at the rotor. That’s the root cause. For 99 percent of your troubles.

Allen Hall: Well, I’ve heard of turbines, not often, but occasionally, where the, where the turbine enters the ground, right?

Or the tower enters the ground, that there’s gaps, big gaps, like almost a foot wide, whereas the turbine’s been swaying around, it’s pushing the soil away from it so much, which means, that’s, at that point, you have major problems, and I’m surprised I see Uh, the technicians and I hear stories about throw more gravel into the hole that’s happened near the tower because the tower is swaying so much like, like that’s going to solve it.

Lars Bendsen: It’s, it’s beyond right. It’s just really when we have, uh, I won’t mention the name of course, we have one customer we kind of rested our case. We can spend more time. That customer had amount of issue on foundation, even turbines falling over, shutting down sites. Second site they’re running, we have evidence that 60 percent of turbines are misaligned, but we cannot get 100, 000 to fix it.

You know what? That’s fine. We have tried now for a couple of years. We rest our case. We told you. We proved it. We measured 10 of your turbines. We know it is. We rest our case. We cannot spend more time if you don’t want to do it. And that is typically one of these situations that comes up to commercial people.

Far away from the site, they only look at dollars. Do we really need it? Do we really need it today, this year? And then the poor guy from operations said, well, we don’t technically need it this year, but, and then they shut it down. Done. So we kind of just resting our case. And, uh, that, but that’s, there is, there is more, there’s sophisticated owners and it has might be less sophisticated owners.

There’s also the owners that, um, financial owners, they get the 8%. We don’t want to hear about it. We do not want to hear. And the, uh, as a management company. Don’t want to take that battle because now their business case looks bad. They get the 8%. And now we’re adding custom operations. Can’t do that. Just gonna pay for gearbox.

Allen Hall: Well, you know, yeah, they like paying for gearboxes clearly How much is a pitch alignment typically to do in terms of time? Is it a day? An hour?

Lars Bendsen: Depending on again if it’s an older, just say V80 You have to go up and change the pit ramps. Our measurement takes 10 15 minutes and then to get it Stop the turbine, get it done, and go back again.

Might be an hour and a half, two hours. And we can re measure, and then it’s okay, and it’s up running. So it’s a two hour operation, worst case scenario. On a newer turbine, many of them, you have a tablet down tower. Siemens 2 3 on many of those. You can simply just put in on a tablet, put an offset in on blade A, B, C.

And it’s running, it’s a five minutes, 10 minutes operation.

Allen Hall: So I assume you can do multiple towers a day then. So you’re talking about in a couple of days, you can do a complete wind farm. Yeah. And stop all the vibration, all the main bearing replacement issues, the gearbox issues, the foundation issues, the cabinet issues in literally a couple of hours

Lars Bendsen: per tower.

We can for sure remove the root case in many of the cases. Again, it’s not like one size fits all. But in many cases we could do that. And, um, let’s say when the turbines are between eight and 12 years old, for sure, 50%, uh, roughly 50%, uh, are misaligned to a certain degree. Um, the better turbines, Siemens 2 3, hands down, they’re the least misaligned turbine, but it’s still about 30%.

And if they’re misaligned, it’s not too, too bad. Siemens has actually a part of their service scope to look after a misalignment. As the only one, as far as I know, they have a bracket they put in, and that works somehow. It’s better than nothing. It’s not ideal, but it’s And I say, okay, it’s, it’s, it’s doable way better than anything else.

Some OEMs don’t even have it in their service scope. Yeah. I, I’ve seen mostly that they don’t have it in the service scope at all. We also have a client where the OEM is supposed to look after that. It’s a pits where they get turbine. I don’t want to want an inch named a brand because some people might be guess where it is.

But, uh, the OEM service screen is supposed to look after that, but they don’t do it. And then the owner said, well, I’m not going to pay for it because they should do it. We have done the whole campaign. So we have put it out there and it’s more than 50 percent of the fleet. And now we have done a project.

We have followed it for two years. And of course, a pitch, sorry, a hydraulic pitch will leak all the time. So the turbo we just adjusted two years ago, that’s all misaligned again. Two years later, not crazy, but it’s been wandering. It’s been misaligned again. Who’s going to pay for that? If it’s a part of the OEM service concept, but they don’t do it, then the owner don’t want to pay for it.

But the owner’s gonna pay anyhow.

Allen Hall: Right, at the end of the day, the owner’s gonna pay anyhow. They

Lars Bendsen: just pay next to the

Allen Hall: gearbox. Well, yeah, you can do a very inexpensive pitch alignment test, or you can replace a gearbox. There’s sort of your choices right now. And I know, well, this is busy season for pitch alignment.

As we get into winter and the ground freezes, and you guys can get out there and do dozens of turbines. Uh, what do people do if they have pitch alignment problems? Do you see their towers swaying? Or the rotor moving in unusual ways? How do they get ahold of you? How do they contact you?

Lars Bendsen: Well, uh, we have the best website in the world, so a3.com.

So, uh, that’s, that’s as simple as it is. Um, and we have equipment, we have, we have capacity. We are doing right now. We are might be gonna buy an extra sort of equipment. It’s quite expensive piece of equipment. We are, we are running, but we are considering buying one more, uh, because we are, we are quite busy for sure.

Doing this year, I think we are six or 700 turbines. We’re done. Uh, this, this season alone. Um, so I think also that, and promotion or not, we know what we are

Allen Hall: doing. Here’s, here’s the, here’s the rub. You can get this done, get the pitch alignment done now, right? When it’s windy season in the wintertime in the United States, this is where everybody makes all their money, but you want to make sure your turbine is operating at peak performance and it doesn’t take much time to get this done.

The problem is, is that if you wait too long. Lars and AC 883 are going to be booked and you’re not going to be able to get them lined up to do this. So if you want to get it done You better get on ac883. com or get ahold of Lars via LinkedIn and get rolling now. And the same thing for the blade repair season.

I’ve had a lot of people contact Joel and me about blade repair season next year. We’re trying to find technicians or we need a capacity. We got problems. We need, we have cat fours and cat fives. We know they’re coming. They need to be reaching out to AC883. Also to get ready for next season because otherwise you’re not gonna have anybody on site.

Uh, so Lars Thank you so much for being on the podcast. It’s great to connect again, and we’re going to see you in Nashville At the O& M.

Lars Bendsen: That’s true. And the Ole Miss down there in Nashville. That would be interesting So the San Diego is a new Nashville and Nashville is new San Diego

Allen Hall: I’m going to miss the ocean, but it’ll be a good time in Nashville.

Thank you so much, Allen.

https://weatherguardwind.com/ac883-lidar-pitch/

Renewable Energy

Poverty in the United States

Published

20 hours ago

January 20, 2026

Alice Rush

There is no doubt that poverty, ignorance, intolerance, and support of criminal tyrants are deeply interconnected. It’s a shame that nothing can be done to help these people.

Poverty in the United States

Renewable Energy

Choosing the Right Commercial Solar System Size for Business

Published

23 hours ago

January 20, 2026

Alice Rush

Undoubtedly, installing a commercial solar system in 2026 is one of the smartest long-term decisions any Australian business can make.

The underlying reason is pretty straightforward!

With electricity prices rising and sustainability becoming increasingly important, solar offers both financial savings and reputational benefits.

But one of the biggest questions business owners face early on is this:

What size solar system do we actually need?

Go too small, and you won’t see the savings you were hoping for. Go too big, and you risk overcapitalising or exporting excess energy at low feed-in rates.

Therefore, the right answer sits somewhere in the middle, and finding it requires more than just a guess.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through the three key steps that determine the right commercial solar system size for your business:

Load analysis
Roof or site assessment
System design considerations

So let’s break down how to help you make a confident decision.

In this blog post:

Step 1: Understanding Your Business Energy Load

This is where it all starts: before panels, inverters, or roof space are even discussed, the most important piece of the puzzle is your energy usage, not just how much you use, but when you use it.

Most businesses start by looking at their electricity bill and focusing on the total kilowatt-hours (kWh) used per month or year.

While that number matters, it’s only part of the story. Look beyond the total kWh because, for solar, the timing of your energy use is critical.

Consider an office, manufacturing facility, medical centre, or retail business that uses most of its electricity between 9 am and 4 pm; it is far more “solar-friendly” than one that uses most of its power overnight, such as cold storage or 24/7 operations.

Daytime vs After-Hours Usage

Before installing solar in your commercial property, ask yourself these:

Are your main operations running during daylight hours?
Do heavy machines, HVAC systems, or production lines operate while the sun is up?
Does usage drop significantly after business hours?

The more energy you use during the day, the more of your business solar power you’ll consume directly, which is where the biggest savings are.

However, in some cases, exporting excess energy back to the grid is beneficial, but feed-in tariffs are usually much lower than what you pay for electricity. For greater financial outcomes, it’s better to install battery storage.

Interval Data: A Standard Method

In Australia, for a proper load analysis, solar professionals typically review interval data, typically 15 or 30 minute usage from your electricity retailer.

This data shows your:

Daily load patterns
Peak demand times
Seasonal variations like summer vs winter

This level of detail allows system sizing to be tailored specifically to your business, rather than depending on rough averages.

Step 2: Roof and Site Assessment – What Can Your Building Actually Handle?

Once energy usage is understood, the next question becomes: where will the system go?

Thinking the same? Here’s your answer!

For most commercial systems, the roof is the obvious choice, but not all roofs are equal in size.

Available Roof Space

Solar panels take up space, and commercial systems can require significant space. The rough estimation says:

100kW system is needed for a roof of 500–600 square metres
200kW system is needed for a roof of 1,000–1,200 square metres

However, usable space is often less than the total roof area. Factors that reduce usable space include:

HVAC units
Skylights
Roof access paths
Setback requirements
Fire safety regulations

Roof Orientation and Tilt

In Australia, north-facing panels generally produce the most energy, but east- and west-facing systems can still perform very well, especially for businesses with high daytime energy requirements.

Also, flat roofs are common on commercial buildings and offer flexibility, as panels can be tilted and oriented at any time using mounting frames.

Structural Integrity

One overlooked factor is whether the roof can physically support the system.

Commercial solar systems add weight, and while it’s usually well within limits, older buildings or lightweight structures may need a structural engineer’s approval.

Therefore, it’s far better to identify this early than be surprised later in the project.

Ground-Mounted and Carport Options

If your roof space is limited, don’t stress out, there are alternative ways, such as:

Ground-mounted solar systems
Solar carports over parking areas

Even these options can increase the system’s potential size but come with higher costs and planning considerations.

Step 3: Matching System Size to Business Needs

A common problem or misconception about solar panels is that bigger is always better. In reality, the best-sized system is one that aligns closely with your energy profile and business goals.

Self-Consumption

Do you know that the highest financial return comes from using solar energy directly on-site?

This is why many commercial systems are designed to offset 60-80% of daytime energy use, rather than 100% of total annual consumption.

Oversizing a system may result in:

Excess exports at low feed-in tariffs
Longer payback periods
Underutilised capital

A perfectly designed system balances generation with actual energy demand.

Future-Proofing

Above all these, it’s also important to think ahead. Therefore, businesses should consider:

Planned expansion
Electric vehicle fleets
New machinery or equipment
Electrification of gas processes

Sometimes installing a slightly larger system, or choosing inverters that support future expansion, makes sense. The goal is to give scalability to your system, not blind oversizing.

Demand Charges and Peak Loads

Many Australian businesses pay demand charges based on their highest usage intervals.

While solar can help reduce daytime demand, it won’t always eliminate peaks, especially if they occur early morning or late afternoon.

In some cases, system design may focus on shaving peaks rather than just maximising total generation.

Which Components Make a Great Commercial Solar System?

A great commercial solar system comes down to a few essential components working together in sync.

Together, these ensure maximum energy output, safety, and return on investment. So, here’s a list:

Solar panels: High-efficiency, durable, long warranties
Inverters: Reliable DC-to-AC conversion and system control
Mounting & racking: Strong, site-specific structural support
Monitoring: Real-time performance tracking and alerts
Safety & protection: Grounding, rapid shutdown, surge and fault protection
Engineering & design: Proper system layout, permitting, and grid compliance

Operations & maintenance: Ongoing inspections to ensure long-term performance

Commercial Solar Batteries: Should They Affect System Size?

In Australia the battery storage is becoming more common, but it’s not always necessary upfront.

For many businesses, only solar panel systems offer the best return on investment. However, batteries tend to make more sense when:

Evening or overnight usage is high
Demand charges are significant
Backup power is critical
Time-of-use tariffs are extreme

Nowadays, most businesses choose to design a battery-ready solar system, allowing storage to be added later as prices in the Australian energy market decline.

Which System is Best for You? The Decision Behind the Panels

Now you might be wondering which solar system best fits your life.

We know every home needs a different solar story. So, beyond the numbers, choosing the right commercial solar system size is about confidence.

Panel Type Options

Monocrystalline solar Panels: These panels have the highest efficiency and are ideal when the roof or land space is limited.
Polycrystalline Solar Panels: They are also a strong choice for Australian businesses seeking a lower upfront cost and are satisfied with slightly reduced efficiency.
Bifacial Solar Panels: They are super-efficient as they generate power from both sides. They are best suited for ground-mounted systems or highly reflective surfaces.

Selecting the right panel type helps ensure your commercial solar system delivers maximum performance and long-term value, so choose wisely.

However, in large-scale commercial properties, business owners often have many concerns. For instance:

Making the wrong investment.
Disrupting operations during commercial solar installation.
Dealing with complex approvals.
Understanding long-term performance.

Keep in mind that a good, accredited solar partner doesn’t just sell you panels; they explain the “why” behind the system size, show realistic projections, and design around how your business actually operates.

Work with Cyanergy| Your Reputable Solar Installer

Well, in the end note, if you are still looking for the right commercial solar system size, honestly, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer.

Every Australian business is different. Whether a warehouse in Victoria, a winery in Queensland, or a medical centre in New South Wales will all have very different solar needs, even if their electricity bills look similar.

Choosing the right commercial solar system size ultimately comes down to understanding your energy usage, making proper use of roof space, and designing a system that fits your business for the long term.

When those pieces align, solar stops being a guessing game and becomes what it should be.

It’s a smart, reliable investment that works quietly in the background while your business gets on with what it does best.

For more informative content and to schedule a proper energy audit, contact Cyanergy today!

Our solar experts will answer all your questions, making the energy transition process hassle-free and faster.

Your Solution Is Just a Click Away

The post Choosing the Right Commercial Solar System Size for Business appeared first on Cyanergy.

Choosing the Right Commercial Solar System Size for Business

Renewable Energy

UK Awards 8.4 GW Offshore, US Allows Offshore Construction

Published

23 hours ago

January 20, 2026

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

UK Awards 8.4 GW Offshore, US Allows Offshore Construction

Allen, Joel, Rosemary, and Yolanda cover major offshore wind developments on both sides of the Atlantic. In the US, Ørsted’s Revolution Wind won a court victory allowing construction to resume after the Trump administration’s suspension. Meanwhile, the UK awarded contracts for 8.4 gigawatts of new offshore capacity in the largest auction in European history, with RWE securing nearly 7 gigawatts. Plus Canada’s Nova Scotia announces ambitious 40 gigawatt offshore wind plans, and the crew discusses the ongoing Denmark-Greenland tensions with the US administration.

Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly newsletter 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 YouTube, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary’s “Engineering with Rosie” YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!

The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast brought to you by Strike Tape, protecting thousands of wind turbines from lightning damage worldwide. Visit strike tape.com. And now your hosts, Alan Hall, Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxon and Yolanda Padron. Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I’m Allen Hall, along with Yolanda, Joel and Rosie.

Boy, a lot of action in the US courts. And as you know, for weeks, American offshore wind has been holding its breath and a lot of people’s jobs are at stake right now. The Trump administration suspended, uh, five major projects on December 22nd, and still they’re still citing national security concerns.

Billions of dollars are really in balance here. Construction vessels for most of these. Sites are just doing nothing at the minute, but the courts are stepping in and Sted won a [00:01:00] key victory when the federal judge allowed its revolution wind project off the coast of Rhode Island to resume construction immediately.

So everybody’s excited there and it does sound like Osted is trying to finish that project as fast as they can. And Ecuador and Dominion Energy, which are two of the other bigger projects, are fighting similar battles. Ecuador is supposed to hear in the next couple of days as we’re recording. Uh, but the message is pretty clear from developers.

They have invested too much to walk away, and if they get an opportunity to wrap these projects up quickly. They are going to do it now. Joel, before the show, we were talking about vineyard wind and vineyard. Wind was on hold, and I think it, it may not even be on hold right now, I have to go back and look.

But when they were put on hold, uh, the question was, the turbines that were operating, were they able to continue operating? And the answer initially I thought was no. But it was yes, the, the turbines that were [00:02:00] producing power. We’re allowed to continue to produce powers. What was in the balance were the remaining turbines that were still being installed or, uh, being upgraded.

So there’s, there’s a lot going on right now, but it does seem like, and back to your earlier point, Joel, before we start talking and maybe you can discuss this, we, there is an offshore wind farm called Block Island really closely all these other wind farms, and it’s been there for four or five years at this point.

No one’s said anything about that wind farm.

Speaker: I think it’s been there, to be honest with you, since like 2016 or 17. It’s been there a long time. Is it that old? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So when we were talk, when we’ve been talking through and it gets lost in the shuffle and it shouldn’t, because that’s really the first offshore wind farm in the United States.

We keep talking about all these big, you know, utility scale massive things, but that is a utility scale wind farm as well. There’s fi, correct me if I’m wrong, Yolanda, is it five turbos or six? It’s five. Their decent sized turbines are sitting on jackets. They’re just, uh, they’re, they’re only a couple miles offshore.

They’re not way offshore. But throughout all of these issues that we’ve had, um, with [00:03:00] these injunctions and stopping construction and stopping this and reviewing permits and all these things, block Island has just been spinning, producing power, uh, for the locals there off the coast of Rhode Island. So we.

What were our, the question was is, okay, all these other wind farms that are partially constructed, have they been spinning? Are they producing power? And my mind goes to this, um, as a risk reduction effort. I wonder if, uh, the cable, if the cable lay timelines were what they were. Right. So would you now, I guess as a risk reduction effort, and this seems really silly to have to think about this.

If you have your offshore substation, was the, was the main export cable connected to some of these like revolution wind where they have the injunction right now? Was that export cable connected and were the inter array cables regularly connected to turbines and them coming online? Do, do, do, do, do. Like, it wasn’t like a COD, we turned the switch and we had to wait for all 62 turbines.

Right. So to our [00:04:00] knowledge and, and, uh, please reach out to any of us on LinkedIn or an email or whatever to our knowledge. The turbines that are in production have still have been spinning. It’s the construction activities that have been stopped, but now. Hey, revolution wind is 90% complete and they’re back out and running, uh, on construction activities as of today.

Speaker 2: It was in the last 48 hours. So this, this is a good sign because I think as the other wind farms go through the courts, they’re gonna essentially run through this, this same judge I that. Tends to happen because they have done all the research already. So you, you likely get the same outcome for all the other wind farms, although they have to go through the process.

You can’t do like a class action, at least that’s doesn’t appear to be in play at the minute. Uh, they’re all gonna have to go through this little bit of a process. But what the judge is saying essentially is the concern from the Department of War, and then the Department of Interior is. [00:05:00] Make believe. I, I don’t wanna frame it.

It’s not framed that way, the way it’s written. There’s a lot more legalistic terms about it. But it basically, they’re saying they tried to stop it before they didn’t get the result they wanted. The Trump administration didn’t get the result they wanted. So the Trump administration ramped it up by saying it was something that was classified in, in part of the Department of War.

The judge isn’t buying it. So the, the, the early action. I think what we initially talked about this, everybody, I think the early feeling was they’re trying to stop it, but the fact that they’re trying to stop it just because, and just start pulling permits is not gonna stand outta the court. And when they want to come back and do it again, they’re not likely to win.

If they would. Kept their ammunition dry and just from the beginning said it’s something classified as something defense related that Trump administration probably would’ve had a better shot at this. But now it just seems like everything’s just gonna lead down the pathway where all these projects get finished.

Speaker: Yeah, I think that specific judge probably was listening to the [00:06:00] Uptime podcast last week for his research. Um, listen to, to our opinions that we talked about here, saying that this is kind of all bs. It’s not gonna fly. Uh, but what we’re sitting at here is like Revolution Wind was, had the injunction against it.

Uh, empire Wind had an injunction again, but they were awaiting a similar ruling. So hopefully that’s actually supposed to go down today. That’s Wednesday. Uh, this is, so we’re recording this on Wednesday. Um, and then Dominion is, has, is suing as well, and their, uh, hearing is on Friday. In two, two days from now.

And I would expect, I mean, it’s the same, same judge, same piece of papers, like it’s going to be the same result. Some numbers to throw at this thing. Now, just so the listeners know the impact of this, uh, dominion for the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project, they say that their pause in construction is costing them $5 million a day, and that is.

That’s a pretty round number. It’s a conservative number to be honest with you. For officer operations, how many vessels and how much stuff is out there? That makes sense. Yep. [00:07:00] 5 million. So $5 million a day. And that’s one of the wind farms. Uh, coastal, Virginia Wind Farm is an $11 billion project. With, uh, it’s like 176 turbines.

I think something to that, like it’s, it’s got enough power, it’s gonna have enough production out there to power up, like, uh, like 650,000 homes when it’s done. So there’s five projects suspended right now. I’m continuing with the numbers. Um, well, five, there’s four now. Revolution’s back running, right? So five and there’s four.

Uh, four still stopped. And of those five is 28. Billion dollars in combined capital at risk, right? So you can understand why some of these companies are worried, right? They’re this is, this is not peanuts. Um, so you saw a little bump in like Ted stock in the markets when this, this, uh, revolution wind, uh, injunction was stopped.

Uh, but. You also see that, uh, Moody’s is a credit [00:08:00] rating. They’ve lowered ORs, Ted’s um, rating from stable to negative, given that political risk.

Speaker 2: Well, if you haven’t been paying attention, wind energy O and m Australia 2026 is happening relatively soon. It’s gonna be February 17th and 18th. It’s gonna be at the Pullman Hotel downtown Melbourne.

And we are all looking forward to it. The, the roster and the agenda is, is nearly assembled at this point. Uh, we have a, a couple of last minute speakers, but uh, I’m looking at the agenda and like, wow, if you work in o and m or even are around wind turbines, this is the place to be in February. From my

Speaker: seat.

It’s pretty, it’s, it’s, it’s shaping up for pretty fun. My phone has just been inundated with text message and WhatsApp of when are you traveling? What are your dates looking forward to, and I wanna say this right, Rosie. Looking forward to Melvin. Did I get it? Did I do it okay.

Speaker 3: You know how to say it.

Speaker: So, so we’re, we’re really looking forward to, we’ve got a bunch of people traveling from around the [00:09:00] world, uh, to come and share their collective knowledge, uh, and learn from the Australians about how they’re doing things, what the, what the risks are, what the problems are, uh, really looking forward to the environment down there, like we had last year was very.

Collaborative, the conversations are flowing. Um, so we’re looking forward to it, uh, in a big way from our seats. Over here,

Speaker 2: we are announcing a lightning workshop, and that workshop will be answering all your lightning questions in regards to your turbines Now. Typically when we do this, it’s about $10,000 per seat, and this will be free as part of WMA 2026.

We’re gonna talk about some of the lightning physics, what’s actually happening in the field versus what the OEMs are saying and what the IEC specification indicates. And the big one is force majeure. A lot of operators are paying for damages that are well within the IEC specification, and we’ll explain.[00:10:00]

What that is all about and what you can do to save yourself literally millions of dollars. But that is only possible if you go to Woma 2020 six.com and register today because we’re running outta seats. Once they’re gone, they’re gone. But this is a great opportunity to get your lightning questions answered.

And Rosemary promised me that we’re gonna talk about Vestus turbines. Siemens turbines. GE Renova turbines. Nordex turbines. So if you have Nordex turbines, Sulan turbines, bring the turbine. Type, we’ll talk about it. We’ll get your questions answered, and the goal is that everybody at at Wilma 2026 is gonna go home and save themselves millions of dollars in 26 and millions of dollars in 27 and all the years after, because this Lightning workshop is going to take care of those really frustrating lightning questions that just don’t get answered.

We’re gonna do it right there. Sign up today.

Speaker 3: [00:11:00] You know what, I’m really looking forward to that session and especially ’cause I’ve got a couple of new staff or new-ish staff at, it’s a great way to get them up to speed on lightning. And I think that actually like the majority of people, even if you are struggling with lightning problems every day, I bet that there is a whole bunch that you could learn about the underlying physics of lightning.

And there’s not so many places to find that in the world. I have looked, um, for my staff training, where is the course that I can send them to, to understand all about lightning? I know when I started atm, I had a, an intro session, one-on-one with the, you know, chief Lightning guy there. That’s not so easy to come by, and this is the opportunity where you can get that and better because it’s information about every, every OEM and a bit of a better understanding about how it works so that you can, you know, one of the things that I find working with Lightning is a lot of force MA mature claims.

And then, um, the OEMs, they try and bamboozle you with this like scientific sounding talk. If you understand better, then you’ll be able to do better in those discussions. [00:12:00] So I would highly recommend attending if you can swing the Monday as well.

Speaker: If you wanna attend now and you’re coming to the events.

Reach out to, you can reach out to me directly because what we want to do now is collect, uh, as much information as possible about the specific turbine types of the, that the people in the room are gonna be responsible for. So we can tailor those messages, um, to help you out directly. So feel free to reach out to me, joel.saxo, SAXU m@wglightning.com and uh, we’ll be squared away and ready to roll on Monday.

I think that’s Monday the 16th.

Speaker 2: So while American offshore wind fights for survival in the courts, British offshore wind just had its biggest day ever. The United Kingdom awarded contracts for 8.4 gigawatts. That’s right. 8.4 gigawatts of new offshore wind capacity, the largest auction in European history.

Holy smokes guys. The price came in at about 91 pounds per megawatt hour, and that’s 2024 pounds. [00:13:00] Uh, and that’s roughly 40% cheaper than building a new. Gas plant Energy Secretary Ed Milliband called it a monumental step towards the country’s 2030 clean power goals and that it is, uh, critics say that prices are still higher than previous auctions, and one that the government faces challenges connecting all this new capacity to the grid, and they do, uh, transmission is a limiting factor here, but in terms of where the UK is headed.

Putting in gigawatts of offshore wind is going to disconnect them from a lot of need on the gas supply and other energy sources. It’s a massive auction round. This was way above what I remember being, uh. Talked about when we were in Scotland just a couple of weeks ago, Joel.

Speaker: Yeah, that’s what I was gonna say.

You know, when we were, when we were up with the, or E Catapult event, and we talked to a lot of the different organizations of their OWGP and um, you know, the course, the or e Catapult folks and, and, and a [00:14:00] few others, they were really excited about AR seven. They were like, oh, we’re, we’re so excited. It’s gonna come down, it’s gonna be great.

I didn’t expect these kind of numbers to come out of this thing. Right? ’cause we know that, um, they’ve got about, uh, the UK currently has about. 16 and a half or so gigawatts of offshore wind capacity, um, with, you know, they got a bunch under construction, it’s like 11 under construction, but their goal is to have 43 gigawatts by 2030.

So,

Speaker 2: man.

Speaker: Yeah. And, and when 2030, put this into Conte Con context now. This is one of our first podcasts of the new year. That’s only four years away. Right. It’s soon. And, and to, to be able to do that. So you’re saying they got 16, they go some round numbers. They got 16 now. Pro producing 11 in the pipe, 11 being constructed.

So get that to 27. That’s another 16 gigawatts of wind. They want, they that are not under construction today that they want to have completed in the next four years. That is a monumental effort now. We know that there’s some grid grid complications and connection [00:15:00] requirements and things that will slow that down, but just thinking about remove the grid idea, just thinking about the amount of effort to get those kind of large capital projects done in that short of timeline.

Kudos to the UK ’cause they’re unlocking a lot of, um, a lot of private investment, a lot of effort to get these things, but they’re literally doing the inverse of what we’re doing in the United States right now.

Speaker 2: There would be about a total of 550, 615 ish megawatt turbines in the water. That does seem doable though.

The big question is who’s gonna be providing those turbines? That’s a. Massive order. Whoever the salesperson is involved in that transaction is gonna be very happy. Well, the interesting thing here

Speaker: too is the global context of assets to be able to deliver this. We just got done talking about the troubles at these wind farms in the United States.

As soon as these. Wind farms are finished. There’s not more of them coming to construction phase shortly, right? So all of these assets, all these jack up vessels, these installation vessels, these specialized cable lay vessels, they [00:16:00]can, they can fuel up and freaking head right across, back across the Atlantic and start working on these things.

If the pre all of the engineering and, and the turbine deliveries are ready to roll the vessels, uh, ’cause that you, that, you know, two years ago that was a problem. We were all. Forecasting. Oh, we have this forecasted problem of a shortage of vessels and assets to be able to do installs. And now with the US kind of, basically, once we’re done with the wind farms, we’re working on offshore, now we’re shutting it down.

It frees those back up, right? So the vessels will be there, be ready to roll. You’ll have people coming off of construction projects that know what’s going on, right? That, that know how to, to work these things. So the, the people, the vessels that will be ready to roll it is just, can we get the cables, the mono piles, the turbines and the cells, the blades, all done in time, uh, to make this happen And, and.

I know I’m rambling now, but after leaving that or e Catapult event and talking to some of the people, um, that are supporting those [00:17:00] funds over there, uh, being injected from the, uh, the government, I think that they’ve got

Speaker 2: the, the money flowing over there to get it done too. The big winner in the auction round was RWE and they.

Almost seven gigawatts. So that was a larger share of the 8.4 gigawatts. RWE obviously has a relationship with Vestus. Is that where this is gonna go? They’re gonna be, uh, installing vestus turbines. And where were those tur turbines? As I was informed by Scottish gentlemen, I won’t name names. Uh, will those turbines be built in the uk?

Speaker 3: It’s a lot. It’s a, it’s one of the biggest challenges with, um, the supply chain for wind energy is that it just is so lumpy. So, you know, you get, um, uh. You get huge eight gigawatts all at once and then you have years of, you know, just not much. Not much, not much going on. I mean, for sure they’re not gonna be just building [00:18:00] eight gigawatts worth of, um, wind turbines in the UK in the next couple of years because they would also have to build the capacity to manufacture that and, and then would wanna be building cocks every couple of years for, you know, the next 10 or 20 years.

So, yeah, of course they’re gonna be manufacturing. At facilities around the world and, and transporting them. But, um, yeah, I just, I don’t know. It’s one of the things that I just. Constantly shake my head about is like, how come, especially when projects are government supported, when plans are government supported, why, why can’t we do a better job of smoothing things out so that you can have, you know, for example, local manufacturing because everyone knows that they’ve got a secure pipeline.

It’s just when the government’s involved, it should be possible.

Speaker 2: At least the UK has been putting forth some. Pretty big numbers to support a local supply chain. When we were over in Scotland, they announced 300 million pounds, and that was just one of several. That’s gonna happen over the next year. There will be a [00:19:00] near a billion pounds be put into the supply chain, which will make a dramatic difference.

But I think you’re right. Also, it’s, they’re gonna ramp up and then they, it’s gonna ramp down. They have to find a way to feed the global marketplace at some point, be because the technology and the people are there. It’s a question of. How do you sustain it for a 20, 30 year period? That’s a different question.

Speaker 3: I do agree that the UK is doing a better job than probably anybody else. Um, it it’s just that they, the way that they have chosen to organize these auctions and the government support and the planning just means that they have that, that this is the perfect conditions to, you know. Make a smooth rollout and you know, take care of all this.

And so I just a bit frustrated that they’re not doing more. But you are right that they’re doing the best probably

Speaker 4: once all of these are in service though, aren’t there quite a bit of aftermarket products that are available in the UK

Speaker: on the service then? I think there’s more.

Speaker 4: Which, I mean, that’s good. A good part of it, right?

Speaker: If we’re talking Vestas, so, so let’s just round this [00:20:00] up too. If we’re talking vest’s production for blades in Europe, you have two facilities in Denmark that build V 2 36 blades. You have one facility in Italy that builds V 2 36 blades, Taiwan, but they build them for the APAC market. Of course. Um, Poland had a, has one on hold right now, V 2 36 as well.

Well, they just bought that factory from LM up in Poland also. That’s, but I think that’s for onshore term, onshore blades. Oh, yes, sure. And then Scotland has, they have the proposed facility in, in Laith. That there, that’s kind of on hold as well. So if that one’s proposed, I’m sure, hey, if we get a big order, they’ll spin that up quick because they’ll get, I am, I would imagine someone o you know, one of the, one of the funds to spool up a little bit of money, boom, boom, boom.

’cause they’re turning into local jobs. Local supply

Speaker 2: chain does this then create the condition where a lot of wind turbines, like when we were in Scotland, a lot of those wind turbines are. Gonna reach 20 years old, maybe a little bit older here over the next five years where they will [00:21:00] need to be repowered upgraded, whatever’s gonna happen there.

If you had internal manufacturing. In country that would, you’d think lower the price to go do that. That will be a big effort just like it is in Spain right now.

Speaker: The trouble there though too, is if you’re using local content in, in the uk, the labor prices are so much

Speaker 2: higher. I’m gonna go back to Rosie’s point about sort of the way energy is sold worldwide.

UK has high energy prices, mostly because they are buying energy from other countries and it’s expensive to get it in country. So yes, they can have higher labor prices and still be lower cost compared to the alternatives. It, it’s not the same equation in the US versus uk. It’s, it’s totally different economics, but.

If they get enough power generation, which I think the UK will, they’re gonna offload that and they’re already doing it now. So you can send power to France, send power up [00:22:00] north. There’s ways to sell that extra power and help pay for the system you built. That would make a a lot of sense. It’s very similar to what the Saudis have done for.

Dang near 80 years, which is fill tankers full of oil and sell it. This is a little bit different that we’re just sending electrons through the water to adjacent European countries. It does seem like a plan. I hope they’re sending ’em through a cable in the water and not just into the water. Well, here’s the thing that was concerning early on.

They’re gonna turn it into hydrogen and put it on a ship and send it over to France. Like that didn’t make any sense at all. Uh. Cable’s on the way to do it. Right.

Speaker: And actually, Alan, you and I did have a conversation with someone not too long ago about that triage market and how the project where they put that, that that trans, that HVDC cable next to the tunnel it, and it made and it like paid for itself in a year or something.

Was that like, that they didn’t wanna really tell us like, yeah, it paid for itself in a year. Like it was a, the ROI was like on a, like a $500 million [00:23:00]project or something. That’s crazy. Um, but yeah, that’s the same. That’s, that is, I would say part of the big push in the uk there is, uh, then they can triage that power and send it, send it back across.

Um, like I think Nord Link is the, the cable between Peterhead and Norway, right? So you have, you have a triage market going across to the Scandinavian countries. You have the triage market going to mainland eu. Um, and in when they have big time wind, they’re gonna be able to do it. So when you have an RWE.

Looking at seven gigawatts of, uh, possibility that they just, uh, just procured. Game on. I love it. I think it’s gonna be cool. I’m, I’m happy to see it blow

Speaker 2: up. Canada is getting serious about offshore wind and international developers are paying attention. Q Energy, France and its South Korean partner. Hawa Ocean have submitted applications to develop wind projects off Nova Scotia’s Coast.

The province has big ambitions. Premier, Tim Houston wants to license enough. Offshore [00:24:00] wind to produce 40 gigawatts of power far more than Nova Scotia would ever need. Uh, the extra electricity could supply more than a quarter of Canada’s total demand. If all goes according to plan, the first turbines could be spinning by 2035.

Now, Joel. Yeah, some of this power will go to Canada, but there’s a huge market in the United States also for this power and the capacity factor up in Nova Scotia offshore is really good. Yeah. It’s uh, it

Speaker: is simply, it’s stellar, right? Uh, that whole No, Nova Scotia, new Brunswick, Newfoundland, that whole e even Maritimes of Canada.

The wind, the wind never stops blowing, right? Like I, I go up there every once in a while ’cause my wife is from up there and, uh, it’s miserable sometimes even in the middle of summer. Um, so the, the wind resource is fantastic. The, it, it is a boom or will be a boom for the Canadian market, right? There’re always [00:25:00] that maritime community, they’re always looking for, for, uh, new jobs.

New jobs, new jobs. And this is gonna bring them to them. Um, one thing I wanna flag here is when I know this, when this announcement came out. And I reached out to Tim Houston’s office to try to get him on the podcast, and I haven’t gotten a response yet. Nova Scotia. So if someone that’s listening can get ahold of Tim Houston, we’d love to talk to him about the plans for Nova Scotia.

Um, but, but we see that just like we see over overseas, the triage market of we’re making power, we can sell it. You know, we balance out the prices, we can sell it to other places. From our seats here we’ve been talking about. The electricity demand on the east coast of the United States for, for years and how it is just climbing, climbing, climbing, especially AI data centers.

Virginia is a hub of this, right? They need power and we’re shooting ourselves in the foot, foot for offshore wind, plus also canceling pipelines and like there’s no extra generation going on there except for some solar plants where you can squeeze ’em in down in the Carolinas and whatnot. [00:26:00] There is a massive play here for the Canadians to be able to HVD see some power down to us.

Speaker 2: The offshore conditions off the coast of Nova Scotia are pretty rough, and the capacity factor being so high makes me think of some of the Brazilian wind farms where the capacity factor is over 50%. It’s amazing down there, but one of the outcomes of that has been early turbine problems. And I’m wondering if the Nova Scotia market is going to demand a different kind of turbine that is specifically built for those conditions.

It’s cold, really cold. It’s really windy. There’s a lot of moisture in the air, right? So the salt is gonna be bad. Uh, and then the sea life too, right? There’s a lot of, uh, sea life off the coast of the Nova Scotia, which everybody’s gonna be concerned about. Obviously, as this gets rolling. How do we think about this?

And who’s gonna be the manufacturer of turbines for Canada? Is it gonna be Nordics? Well,

Speaker: let’s start from the ground up there. So from the or ground up, it’s, how about sea [00:27:00] floor up? Let’s start from there. There is a lot of really, really, if you’ve ever worked in the offshore world, the o offshore, maritime Canadian universities that focus on the, on offshore construction, they produce some of the best engineers for those markets, right?

So if you go down to Houston, Texas where there’s offshore oil and gas companies and engineering companies everywhere, you run into Canadians from the Maritimes all over the place ’cause they’re really good at what they do. Um, they are developing or they have developed offshore oil and gas platforms.

Off of the coast of Newfoundland and up, up in that area. And there’s some crazy stuff you have to compete with, right? So you have icebergs up there. There’s no icebergs in the North Atlantic that like, you know, horn seats, internet cruising through horn C3 with icebergs. So they’ve, they’ve engineered and created foundations and things that can deal with that, those situations up there.

But you also have to remember that you’re in the Canadian Shield, which is, um, the Canadian Shield is a geotechnical formation, right? So it’s very rocky. Um, and it’s not [00:28:00] like, uh, the other places where we’re putting fixed bottom wind in where you just pound the piles into the sand. That’s not how it’s going to go, uh, up in Canada there.

So there’s some different engineering that’s going to have to take place for the foundations, but like you said, Alan Turbine specific. It blows up there. Right. And we have seen onshore, even in the United States, when you get to areas that have high capacity burning out main bearings, burning out generators prematurely because the capacity factor is so high and those turbines are just churning.

Um, I, I don’t know if any of the offshore wind turbine manufacturers are adjusting any designs specifically for any markets. I, I just don’t know that. Um, but they may run into some. Some tough stuff up there, right? You might run into some, some overspeeding main bearings and some maintenance issues, specifically in the wintertime ’cause it is nasty up there.

Speaker 2: Well, if you have 40 gigawatts of capacity, you have several thousand turbines, you wanna make sure really [00:29:00] sure that the blade design is right, that the gearbox is right if you have a gearbox, and that everything is essentially over-designed, heated. You can have deicing systems on it, I would assume that would be something you would be thinking about.

You do the same thing for the monopoles. The whole assembly’s gotta be, have a, just a different thought process than a turbine. You would stick off the coast of Germany. Still rough conditions at times, but not like Nova Scotia.

Speaker: One, one other thing there to think about too that we haven’t dealt with, um.

In such extreme levels is the, the off the coast of No. Nova Scotia is the Bay of Fundee. If you know anything about the Bay of Fundee, it is the highest tide swings in the world. So the tide swings at certain times of the year, can be upwards of 10 meters in a 12 hour period in this area of, of the ocean.

And that comes with it. Different time, different types of, um, one of the difficult things for tide swings is it creates subsid currents. [00:30:00] Subsid currents are, are really, really, really bad, nasty. Against rocks and for any kind of cable lay activities and longevity of cable lay scour protection around turbines and stuff like that.

So that’s another thing that subsea that we really haven’t spoke about.

Speaker 3: You know, I knew when you say Bay Bay of funding, I’m like, I know that I have heard that place before and it’s when I was researching for. Tidal power videos for Tidal Stream. It’s like the best place to, to generate electricity from.

Yeah, from Tidal Stream. So I guess if you are gonna be whacking wind turbines in there anyway, maybe you can share some infrastructure and Yeah. Eca a little bit, a little bit more from your, your project.

Speaker 2: that wraps up another episode of the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. If today’s discussion sparked any questions or ideas. We’d love to hear from you. Just reach out to us on LinkedIn and don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode.

And if you found value in today’s conversation, please leave us a review. It really helps other wind energy professionals discover the show For Rosie, Yolanda and Joel, I’m Alan Hall, and we’ll see you here next week on the Uptime [00:36:00] Wind Energy Podcast.