Published

2 years ago

June 5, 2024

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

Blade Platforms: Revolutionizing Blade Repair Access

In this episode, Petr Bartusek from Blade Platforms discusses how their truck-mounted platforms, capable of safely reaching over 100 meters, are transforming wind turbine blade repair access. With increased speed, skill utilization, and 24-hour shift capabilities, using Blade Platforms minimizes turbine downtime and maximizes efficiency in blade repair campaigns.

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.com
Weather Guard Lightning Tech – www.weatherguardwind.com
Intelstor – https://www.intelstor.com

Allen Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I’m your host, Allen Hall, along with my co host, Joel Saxum, today, we’re tackling a critical issue in the wind industry. Accessing wind turbine blades for repairs. And our guest is Petr Bartusek, commercial VP of Blade Platforms. And Blade Platforms is a truck mounted platform company based in Abilene, Texas.

And with wind turbines hubs reaching new heights, traditional repair access methods can be slow and inefficient. Blade Platforms solves this problem with a fleet of machines that can safely reach over 100 meters, allowing technicians to quickly and efficiently repair blades while minimizing turbine downtime.

Today, Petr will share how Blade Platforms is transforming blade repair access and discuss the future of this innovative company in the wind industry. Petr, welcome to the show.

Petr Bartusek: All right. Thanks for having me.

Allen Hall: So Joel and I happened to visit your facility in Abilene. And the reason we did was because of speed.

It comes down to quickness and our strike click take application where we’re touching a lot of blades, we have to get up and down very quickly because we touched so many blades simultaneously, which is a common industry problem. If you’re going to fix one blade pretty easy, you can use whatever method.

But when we’re. At some farms that have a hundred, 200, 300 plus turbines, it becomes so slow and efficient that there has to be a new way to do it, a faster way to get on blade and to make repairs. And this is where we stopped. And Abilene met with your folks down there at Blade Platforms. It is impressive the speed at which you guys move and it has really changed the industry.

And we, Joel and I have been around a lot of parts of Texas and Oklahoma and we see Blade Platforms. And now we understand why, because you’re really changing the industry.

Petr Bartusek: I’ll add, it’s not just speed, I think. There’s a couple of things. You get speed, you get skill, and you get time utilization, right?

So the speed kind of speaks for itself, right? I tell everyone on a 12 hour day, We’ll do 11 hours worth of work, right? So you got some truck set up time and, some idle time that just, you cannot monetize that, that, that’s one aspect. The other thing is utilization of time and that, these sites are, on windy projects, right?

So you’re, you don’t put turbines where the wind doesn’t blow. So you have to be able to operate in increments of time. When that happens. I use a traditional means of access or ropes or suspended platforms. It’s the rigging time and everything else that goes into it changes the dynamics of what you’re doing because, let’s say you got a rig for two hours, then you go up and you get a three hour weather window.

Then you got to go down and maybe or maybe not, you have to pull it a day. If at two o’clock a storm roll in or something will happen. So for us, we get, six hours worth of work. There’s three hours storm going through. All of a sudden we can take a, three hour lunch to kill that storm, weather a storm, and then we go work again.

So that’s what I would call the time utilization. Third aspect, which is skill or training, right? And the way I look at it is the older you get as a skilled technician, the less likely you are. To be one, I hang on the ropes. So let’s say you’re 20 year old. This is fun. You’re 40. You may have some midsection weight, you may have some bum knees.

You know, you’ve acquired a lot of knowledge and you. Basically could become a liability rather than an assets to a traditional access company. Whereas with us, if your knees a little bum, it doesn’t matter if used to be 175 and now you’re 275. It’s not that big of a deal because the basket can handle 1, 300 pounds.

So we can then effectively monetize or help our customers monetize The skill that particular technician has already built up over, let’s say, 10, 15, 20 years. So I think that those are the 3 advantages that I see. It’s the time utilization and the skill utilization that comes with it.

And I’m not even talking about the safety aspects of, being up there where, there’s 4 redundant systems or how you can get down and. You don’t have to worry about anything.

Joel Saxum: And I can speak to that too, Petr. So I know that you guys have some aid in house that can help someone with a bit of a blade issue if they need it. But if a company has technicians that they need to put up there, this is not, you don’t have to come to site and do a three day training mechanism or something when this, when the. Blade Platform’s truck shows up, there’s a technician with it, there’s a, there’s someone who can operate it I was there, like I was gonna say, I’ll speak to this we came to the Abilene facility, saw the fantastic facility when you pull in, all the trucks everywhere being worked on the army of people maintaining these things and making sure they’re ready to go at a minute’s notice, I did an orientation with one of your techs on site who was fantastic.

Rigged, the guys rigged me up for a harness and showed me where to hook off and all these things. And within 5 minutes I was up 200 and some odd feet in the air. Just a little scared, I’m gonna be honest with you. I think I was the one who actually said, Okay, that’s high enough, we’re good here. I have a beautiful view of Abilene, Texas, right from the sky.

But what I’m saying or what I’m getting at there is if you have technicians or if you have people on the ground already, they don’t need to go through a big training program to do this, right? It was literally 15 minutes of orientation, safety rigging up a harness, which if you’re in a wind industry, you already probably have your own or you know how to do it anyways.

And then Going up and you’re ready to work, right? It was like, now we’re ready to go.

Petr Bartusek: Yeah, that’s exactly it. As long as you have your basic wind search, which is your, safety GW now, which, it’s becoming the prevalent requirement it’s more of an orientation for you, Hey, here’s where you’re going to step here is where you’re going to clip your lanyard.

And then you’re good to go. And then other than that, you’ve been trained for everything. So you’re right. Our unit will roll up to site. Or whoever needs to use it, but I would call self contained. That means there is an operator in the basket. They’ll do all the work. And we also have a ground control technician.

That’s somebody who manages the ground, make sure nobody gets underneath because there is a drop zone. If something were to happen, this person can also serve as a secondary rescue. So if you’ve never seen these units as a future potential customer it’s out of sight, out of mind. Almost.

We roll in, we’d set up everything and we take your super skilled technician or inspector or whoever that needs to be and take him up and then they got to do whatever they got to do. We do have a limited capability. So helping mostly our OEM customers in house, but. Our bread and butter is truly truck rental and access and truck sales.

Joel Saxum: The majority of platforms or the majority, I’m saying platforms as in turbines, right? The majority of the turbines out in the fleet in the United States right now are, or let’s say North America in general, are under a hundred meter hub height. A lot of them, 80 meters, 90 meters for the majority of the fleet.

It’s pretty odd that you get turbines over a hundred meters. So what that means is I know that you guys have trucks at all different levels, like you have 30 meter access all the way to a hundred meter access, correct?

Petr Bartusek: Correct. Yeah, we go 30, 50, 70, 75, 90, and then 103.

Joel Saxum: That’s flipping a football field on its nose and going from the end of the end zone to the end of the other end zone.

Not the, not just the end lines, but the whole thing. That’s huge. You’re 330 feet and you’re 340.

Petr Bartusek: 336 is almost 340. These trucks are actually the highest reaching trucks that exist in North America, South America, probably in Europe.

Joel Saxum: So with these, all these different heights, right? So if you wanted to go just work on the tip of a turbine blade, great.

If you want to go up the side of the tower and look underneath the nacelle, great. If you want to go and work the whole blade length of the tower, we can do that as well. But all of these different heights also have different kind of wind restrictions to go with it, right? Because you’re not going to be up at 100 meters with a 20 meter per second wind, like that’s just not going to happen, right?

But what do the wind restrictions look like for you guys? Because I’m just looking at weather windows.

Petr Bartusek: Yeah for us traditionally, especially on a newer fleet we have what’s called an extended wind regime. So the truck is 12 and a half meters a second, 16 meters a second, and 19 meters a second that you actually can go and operate.

It may have a restricted envelope, so you may not able to hit the full reach. So 90 meter truck, you got only hit. 80 meters at 19 meters a second. And you may not hit the full outreach, which is up to 130 feet. Then you may be limited to a hundred feet on outreach, during those dicey conditions, nobody will want to do anything crazy.

And most wind farms will catch you off at 12, 12 meters a second anyway, because it’s just considered the safe. safe practice. I think for us where it comes in is that, Hey, I know the truck can handle a lot higher wind gusts. So everybody’s safe and then it allows you to finish a job in an emergency situation.

So that’s the use we’re looking at for the extended working at a low based on extended wind regime.

Joel Saxum: Yeah, because at the, in a general rule of thumb, there isn’t many turbines out there that you would even lock out after 15 meters per second. Most of them you just feather the blades negative and let it sit up there.

You’re not going to be able to work on them no matter what the access method is that’s wind speed.

Petr Bartusek: Yeah, that’s right. And, operators want to make money too. We can generate, they want to add the other day that’s their business. We get it. And again, that’s why I know we have the capability and capacity.

We don’t really, dangle the carrot much in front of people because it’s, we’re going to work to a point where it’s safe. And where are we adding value? So if, let’s say you’re working just on the tip, and you start getting 30 meters a second, we could probably still be there. The tip may be flapping to where it’s just not safe for the basket or it’s you’re just, you can be up in the air, but you’re creating zero value because you can’t actually do the work.

It depends on where you’re working on that flight. If I’m somewhere, mid span or max core, there’s a lot less movement. Okay. On that blade, so it could still be possible to finish the job, but at a tip, it just poses a whole other dimension.

Joel Saxum: Okay, so we’ve talked about 30, 30 all the way to a hundred meter reach height.

How many trucks do you guys have? What does the fleet look like?

Petr Bartusek: Pushing close to 40, it’s 35 plus. There is a pipeline of about 10 trucks being delivered each year. As we have it, we’re currently still evaluating the mix. I know this is more of a wind show, but we’ve made a huge leap into the transmission space which is adjacent market for us.

That changed our mix a little bit. We operate in other spaces too, like aerospace construction, building big stadiums and highly bridges and whatever else just needs some special equipment like this, but our bread and butter is traditionally going to be wind power.

And transmission, right? With. You’re talking about the average hub height being 80, 90 meters. Your workhorse truly ends up being a 90 meter machine which is a 295 footer. So that means that no matter what happens, you’re going to roll on the side, you can hit it and you don’t have to worry about it because it’s a, it’s an overall workhorse.

Now, if you know you’re only structuring a campaign that’s geared maybe towards strike tape and leading edge protection, Then the 50 or 70 meter variety will likely do. And, there is obviously money savings because it’s a cheaper machine to start with. But it’s going to be limited to that particular campaign that you’re doing.

Allen Hall: And what are the restrictions about moving such a large vehicle around in the United States? Are there permits and things that need to be pulled before? Bringing it some parts.

Petr Bartusek: The problem with the DLT generally is that each state has individual DLTs. There is not like a federal DLT that would make everything super easy.

So each state may have different requirements on weight, actual spacing and how much weight you can have on each axle, basically 30, 50, 70 meter variety. You can drive around the U. S. without any issues at all. That includes California which is not a super friendly state to large equipment.

The 90 meters virtually drivable everywhere except a couple states where they may need to get low boyed. And, it’s just, it’s a permit situation of 1 to 3 days wait, depending on what each state requires, and the 100 meters, they’re about 50 60. I would say about half of the states are.

Road friendly and half of the states are not. So sometimes you end up having to piecemeal Hey, we’re going to drive here. Then you’re going to put it in a low boy, fortunately own a low boy in house. So that makes moves a lot easier on us. And then, again, you get to unload it and you can drive.

It has to do with the overall weight of the vehicle or axle spacing.

Joel Saxum: But when it, when it comes to access within a wind farm, at one point in time, all of these wind farms were built with heavy trucks having to move usually big crawler cranes in, so the roads are, the roads and pads are good for you guys, the bridges, the bridge crossings, the roads around the wind farms once you get to the site, there’s, there should be no issues, no matter what the place is, unless it’s like, Hey, you can’t, put a, put an outrigger out here because the sage grouse is mating this spring or something like that.

You might run into a deal, but there’s nothing we can do about those.

Petr Bartusek: No, generally there are no issues at all. Especially if the turbine operator or, the construction company was a good steward to the County. If they were not, sometimes we walk into the hornet’s nest, they just close.

And I say, Hey, we know it’s not you guys that, that build it or, it’s. It’s not an angry landowner that, didn’t want to sign and now he doesn’t have a turbine on his field and his neighbor has five turbines and all of a sudden this guy has a brand new truck every year and neighbor doesn’t.

There’s that type of dynamic we walk into. There is some specific seasonal issues like, where there’s a little whale mating or some salamanders somewhere in California or, you’re going to have frost loss up north that, that kick in or if you had heavy rain somewhere in the Iowa cornfields or, even in the corpus area, then the ground is too soft.

So you may wait 2 or 3 days for it to dry, but yeah, no, we don’t have access issues. I think there is one site somewhere in New Hampshire that we have to get a little bit of a. So with a tractor just because the grade was relatively steep, but if any, if a truck can get there, if a car can get there, we usually don’t have issues and our truck are, all wheel drive and rear steering, so we can navigate sites pretty well.

Allen Hall: I think I’ve been to that site in New Hampshire. It is very steep. So that makes a lot of sense. So do you cover Canada as well as the United States? What’s your territory here?

Petr Bartusek: We so we specialize in the U. S. We have the ability to go to Canada. I don’t necessarily pursue it actively, passively we do it.

But there is just so much work in the U. S. for our trucks that, that to actually focus on Canada, it’s borderline counterproductive, nothing against Canadians, I like hockey and everything else. But the service window is so much shorter up there than it is stateside because of the climate and certain provinces have certain restrictions, and, French Canada being one of the harshest ones.

That it, it poses a whole new aspect in terms of, how you bill how you kind of work around labor laws, what you cannot do. So it, again, customer orders it, we’ll bring it there or bring it to the border and they can take it, we’ll deliver it. I say yes, but I don’t seek it out.

Joel Saxum: That’s a market that could greatly benefit from the efficiency of the trucks, right? But if it’s not, if it’s not good, if it’s not as good for your business model, like I get it, like just stay down here and make money where the hate.

Petr Bartusek: What they could benefit is something we discovered by accident about two years ago.

Actually, we discovered we were the beneficiary. Some of our customers discovered it and they’re saying, Hey, the machine doesn’t get tired. Why don’t we run two shifts? That’s something that probably should be utilized in Canada. That is, there is so much work that you truly cannot get everything done in a season.

And especially of the shoulder sort of season. The weather’s a little dicey. So he tried to compress everything into where she was saying may through September in an ideal case. And if everybody had their wish, it would be like June through August. So at that point, how do you.

How do you handle the limited capacity of trucks or technicians that want R& Rs and everything else that is happening? So we’ve been with a couple of our customers. We’ve been running a 24 hour shift. That means I actually have two sets of operators and they have two sets of light decks and we run around the clock.

And that truly is, we’re into what I’ve called the peak season.

Joel Saxum: Yeah, take advantage of the good weather windows, right? Yeah, we know that, like if you’re working on site, even in the U. S., once September hits and October starts looking, if you’re working anywhere north of basically South Texas, you have the possibility of snow or some other bad weather moving in, why not?

You could get two weeks worth of, Or four weeks worth of work done in two weeks if you run night shifts. That’s just makes sense.

Petr Bartusek: And with less of a standby risk, right? So your actual two weeks. Could mean six weeks in real life, right? Cause it gives you a factor, a standby.

So yeah, it’s not everyone’s receptive to it. Again, I did not invent it. I’m sure this is being used because the petrochemical industry all the time during shutdown and turnaround, but, some of our customers came to us and say, Hey, this is what we want to do. And, always figure out how to say yes.

So that is my job, virtually and then operation guys have to figure out how they gonna deliver on that.

Allen Hall: That does seem like a really good idea. And I know there’s a lot of operators that have used Blade Platforms, but there’s still a substantial number that haven’t used your services yet.

How do they reach out to you, Petr? How do they get ahold of Blade Platforms?

Petr Bartusek: So the easiest way is the 21st century, that’s www.bladeplatforms.com. That probably will guide you to our 1 800 number, or, eventually get you to someone who you’ve talked to and they can get to me. I don’t mind sharing my number.

That’s 469-371-4284. If someone needs to get me direct.

Allen Hall: If you need Blade Platforms services, go to bladeplatforms. com. Check out their website, get ahold of Petr. They are really efficient and are experts on blade upgrades and blade repairs. So this Petr, it’s been great having you on the podcast.

Thank you so much for joining. Awesome. Thank you guys. Thanks for having me.

https://weatherguardwind.com/blade-platforms-turbine-blade-repair-access/

Renewable Energy

Big Win for Those Incapable of Elementary School Math

Published

9 hours ago

May 1, 2026

Alice Rush

The Chinese ownership of American farmland is less than 0.00036, or 0.036%. To put this into perspective, if the entirety of U.S. farmland were reduced to one acre, the Chinese government and business interests would own less than 15 square feet, about half the size of a small broom closet.

Yet, true to form, this is a huge issue for the MAGA base.

Big Win for Those Incapable of Elementary School Math

Renewable Energy

Social Justice and Despotism?

Published

14 hours ago

April 30, 2026

Alice Rush

This guy is quite effective in talking to uneducated, conservative Americans, most of whom have never traveled to, or even read anything about the happiest countries on Earth.

If I were going to make a statement about the relationship between social justice and despotism, I would at least consider the lives of the people in places that consider social justice to be something of importance, and compare/contrast this to the list of the countries that are perennially at the top of the World Happiness Rankings.

What makes the people in New Zealand, Iceland, Costa Rica, Northern Europe, etc., so happy? Why do these are these nations suffer exactly zero despotism?

I would be completely ashamed of myself if I were to forward a political theory that had precisely no basis in fact.

Social Justice and Despotism?

Renewable Energy

Technical Training Academy Expands Across Renewables

Published

19 hours ago

April 30, 2026

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

Technical Training Academy Expands Across Renewables

Nick Martocci, founder of Technical Training Academy in Las Vegas, joins to discuss expanding from wind technician training to other energy technologies and career pathways for veterans in energy.

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!

Welcome to Uptime Spotlight, shining Light on Wind. Energy’s brightest innovators. This is the Progress Powering tomorrow.

Allen Hall: Nick, welcome back to the program. We’re Tower Trading Academy. Now your technical trading Academy since we last spoke and we last spoke at OM and S in Nashville. Yep. Now we’re here in Orlando. A lot’s changed over the last year.

Nick Martocci: We went through a lot of growth and changes, if you will, to the point where, because I added the program from just wind turbine technician to battery energy storage technician as well.

And obviously like always I’ve got something brewing behind the green curtain. Right, right. Uh, we’re, we’re always doing something and adding and changing training. And what we really did is get to a place where we’re getting really technical with some of the things that we’re doing. And what I did want to [00:01:00] do is rebrand, go through all of the, you know, uh, marketing and pieces again, and try to change things.

And so I tried to find what was the most simplistic, easy pivot, but also kept us out in the people’s eye. Yeah. And we went to Technical Training Academy. So we really didn’t have to do a whole heavy rebrand. We didn’t have to change a lot, but those that are already working with us, it was just letting them know, Hey, we are still Legally Tower Training Academy.

Even the Department of Labor recognizes that, uh, we just have a DBA in place and the DBA doing business as, uh, allows us to now really open that up as far as what are we capable of doing when it comes to. Deliverables for, you know, people in energy and those types of security places.

Allen Hall: Well, I’ve been watching your shorts.

I, they’re on YouTube or on LinkedIn. They’re really good. The little clips about what you [00:02:00] guys are up to, they’re excellent. And the, what I follow, because I, I met you several times, it was just kind of cool to follow the progression there. The state of Nevada has recognized you. There’s a lot of, uh, congratulatory, uh, events that are happening and like, all right, Hey, Nick’s making this thing happen because it’s so hard to be in that training business.

Mm-hmm. To get to where you have brought that whole company. Two is all right. This, this is a, this is a good spot.

Nick Martocci: Yeah. Uh, you’re

Allen Hall: making some progress

Nick Martocci: there. We had Susie Lee’s office last year help us announce the Battery Energy Storage Program, so there was a congressional recognition there as well. Uh, we’ve also been working with other local politicians and things of that nature to be able to showcase some of the things that not just TTA is doing, but veterans and energy.

Because of my partnership with Project Vanguard, I am a state, uh, representative [00:03:00] for Project Vanguard in the state of Nevada. So it’s another piece of also being able to showcase, hey, this is not just what TTA is doing, but what are veterans doing in energy? And I want to be able to not only highlight, you know, obviously TTA, but those pieces as well.

And whatever you state, you know, the veteran pieces, obviously legislators will listen, if that makes sense. That when you start saying, Hey, a veteran is speaking legislation. We’ll quiet down for a second to see, hey, what is this rumble that you guys are creating? And they start to see what we’re doing and they wanna be a part of that.

Allen Hall: Well, I think that’s wonderful. And all the effort and time that you put towards veterans and veteran efforts. Mm-hmm. Thank you so much for doing that. You’re a veteran, you’re a helicopter pilot, you served Yep. Uh, for a number of years. That’s a difficult job. I, you know, obviously the US is involved in some activity at the moment, but.

You know, shout out to all the veterans out there, [00:04:00] obviously. And, and there’s a lot of ’em in renewable energy right now.

Nick Martocci: Well, I mean, not just renewables, but energy, period. ’cause I, I speak to a lot of veterans throughout my downtime, if you’ll say I have that. And you know, the, there’s people that are PMs, program project managers, there are folks that are doing logistics, warehouse hr, and seeing that movement migration.

Of transitioning individuals from active duty, even some folks that are in my program that are in the guard and now getting into a position where, hey, you know, I’m a technician. I’m in energy. Whether they’re a wind turbine tech, they’re in battery, solar, hydro, what have you. Uh, there are quite a number of veterans in the energy market and industry.

Allen Hall: So if you’re a veteran right now or just exiting, uh, the military. I, I think a lot of opportunity is there. They may not [00:05:00] realize. Mm-hmm. Uh, so getting trained up is a lot easier than it used to be. I remember years ago, I think I, we knew people that came outta the military and, and they were just sort of tossed out the door and had to go find things for themselves.

There’s a lot more resources now I would Right. I it feel like than there were even a couple of years ago. And it’s people like you that are kind of bridging that gap for the military to, to get people onboard, to get people trained, to get ’em out in. And doing work in the civilian world, that’s huge.

Nick Martocci: Yeah.

There’s so many leadership traits and skills that veterans already bring to the table. It’s a matter of taking some of those skills that maybe they, you know, worked in motor T and uh, and the motor pools, and they were turning wrenches and fixing, you know, Humvees and other, you know, mechanical vehicles, or they were.

Um, A and p, so airframe and power plant for, uh, aviation and things of that nature. Sure. So now they understand these different types of systems. Already it’s a matter of, oh, how, [00:06:00] how do I transition this over to wind? How do I transition this over to solar? How do I transition this to battery and such? And then be able to pick that up?

It, it, it makes it easier for them because of the familiarity, if you will. To be able to say, Hey, this is very similar to that. All I gotta do is change this information here and now I’m good to go.

Allen Hall: Right. And Project Vanguard’s helping with that a a great deal.

Nick Martocci: Oh yeah. You talked about Project Vanguard, if you don’t know what that is, so Project Vanguard is an initiative to help veterans get into renewable energy careers, utilizing the network that we already have because.

Um, America’s energy is our security as well, and so who better to help take care of the nation’s security of energy than veterans who have already been doing it. And so being able to help individuals, like I said, not always be a technician. Maybe they wanna be able to get into, uh, program or project management.

Maybe they want to get into hr. And by utilizing the [00:07:00] vast network that Project Vanguard has, it, it gives them that ease of entrance and access that maybe they didn’t have before.

Allen Hall: Well, that’s the key. Finding out where those opportunities lie, and it’s hard to do that on your own. Right. Reaching out for some help is the right answer, I think all the time.

And every, especially now, uh, there’s a lot of, uh, military focused companies that, like technical training Academy that are bridging that gap and, and absolutely. That’s fantastic. Now, the amount of training you’re doing on site is impressive and you’re, you’re growing. You’re into Best now, and you’re into more, more and more training, doing some OSHA training.

So there’s a lot of resources available and the website’s been updated. Right. And I think a lot of people are, go to the website, just Google it. You can get there. But the offerings are getting more expansive. The, the technical details are getting deeper into the aspects of all parts of the industry,

Nick Martocci: right?

We’ve worked with, uh, a few entities, uh, to name Drop Ner [00:08:00] and um, destructible. They’ve donated quite a bit of different pieces for our training programs, for blades, for brake systems and things of that nature. For us to be able to take our program to that next level and actually put what technicians are going to be putting their hands on in our training places rather than something as simple as a, uh, like an theory plate piece and actually putting something that a manufacturer is building for these entities.

And saying, Hey, here, this is the exact same thing you’re gonna see, uh, they donated a, a unit that goes to a GE one X, but you know, if you go out to a four X, it’s gonna be the same thing, just a little bigger.

Allen Hall: Bigger. Right,

Nick Martocci: right. And, and so it, it makes it so that it goes from serious hands-on theory to, oh, I’ve seen something just like this, but it was a little smaller.

This is just bigger. I get it. Same thing. And so with destructible being able to make those donations for blades and other pieces. Uh, we’re putting together a LPS program, lightning [00:09:00] Protection Systems. Oh,

Allen Hall: good.

Nick Martocci: And so that’s something That’s awesome. Yeah, it’s something that, it’s a

Allen Hall: lightning protection company.

That’s fantastic.

Nick Martocci: You know, uh, there’s a lot of stuff coming down the pipe for all of those additional pieces. We, we even revamped our whole website when we did the name change back in July, and it allows people to be able to go in and see all those pieces that we’re doing. One of the things is we became a Sprat facility, so being able to do rope access, especially when it comes to those offshore technicians and things of that nature.

So we’re gonna be able to. Help out the wind industry with a lot more of those pieces that they’re looking for. Uh, like I said, the rope access, they’re definitely gonna need, uh, for offshore and things of that nature. Uh, being able to do LPS training, there’s so many other pieces. I’m gonna try not to reveal that we’re working on that are in addition to just the apprenticeship program, but okay.

Somebody went out to the field, I want to get a certification in. Become better SME in this piece and start putting building blocks into people’s [00:10:00]careers.

Allen Hall: Well, that’s the key, right? It it’s the industry’s grown to be more SMEs being on site.

Nick Martocci: Yep.

Allen Hall: And there you have your gearbox people, you have your electrical, diagnosing, debugging people that are out there.

And I think as the industry evolves, we’re gonna have more subject matter experts on sites. Mm-hmm. Doing LPS systems, doing gear boxes, handling some of the electrical things that are happening, even in blades and blade repair. They’re becoming more of subject matter experts. ’cause you have people that, that’s what they do.

They are the expert in fixing this particular kind of blade problem. And they make a great living doing that.

Nick Martocci: And uh, one of the other things that we’re doing is the complimentary training. Right. And what I mean by that is I’ve partnered with, uh, CSN

Allen Hall: Oh Good

Nick Martocci: College of Southern Nevada. Uh, I’m also partnering with some other universities and working on those pieces because I understand that technicians, as they grow in this industry, they want to be able to do other [00:11:00] things, whether that be be a pm, be an engineer.

They want to be able to go and get that piece. And so if I can help refer through our partnerships. Hey, if you want to go get your construction management at CSN, we’re a preferred partner, go talk to. This individual and we can actually, rather than say, Hey, go forth and do great things, we can actually say, Hey, you need to speak to this person, and you know what?

Better yet, let me do an email intro. Making it easier for the end user to actually now say, Hey, you know what? That was so much easier when you create that holistic program similar to what I’ve done, which doesn’t just say, Hey, here, you’re a technician. Bye. Um, you’re actually a part of their career. That, that’s one of the major big things that just really stuck out as far as a different difference maker from me to everybody else.

I don’t just say, Hey, here you go. I, I create a program [00:12:00] with you and your career in mind. You can call back to either TTA or my other business, IFC, infinite Fidelis Consulting, and that is exactly what they do. They, it’s a nonprofit that does workforce development. That is exactly what they do, and they will help.

And so through those partnerships, you now have access immediately to those resources. And I think some of the misnomers and steps that I’ve seen before me is, is exactly that of, hey, you know, we’re finished, right? We’ve taken care of your certs, we’ve taken care of your basic training. Bye-bye. And there there is no un until you see ’em in two years and you do their recertification.

Then you don’t really get to interact with them. And so there’s two years of just what I call dead space. There’s just two, two years of I’ve never seen this person again. And that’s, if they come back to me, they might work for company A, B, or C. And that company might have an internal recertification program where now I’m not [00:13:00] able to still help them and they’re just on a maybe.

Well, that’s where Technical Training Academy

Allen Hall: is doing something different. I, I think you’re right about. The, some of the training schools that exist today are very focused on getting technicians out on a site, and then that’s where it ends. The, the problem is those people tend to grow, especially if they’re from the military.

They tend to go up and rank as they get out in the field a little bit because they do, are doing the right things and every, the, the management realizes I’ve got these people out there that know what they’re doing. I’m gonna promote them, I’m gonna make them the lead, I’m gonna make them the project manager, I’m gonna expand their role.

But you have to also learn that skillset, right? And I think that’s where you’re thinking ahead and trying to help those people grow as they get more experience.

Nick Martocci: And I’m probably repeating myself from two years ago, but this is why I built it. I built it off of the similar frame of leadership style and progression piece that is familiar to us as veterans in the military.

When you’re an E [00:14:00] one, you’re being groomed to be an E two. E two to be groomed to be an E three in, in the civilian world, there really is no grooming process to help you do that ladder climbing piece. And what I wanted to do was help bridge that gap,

Allen Hall: right?

Nick Martocci: And help put those support structures and pieces in place so that somebody could say, Hey, I want to do this.

Who can help me? Well, you can come over to TTA or IFC and we’ll give you a hand. No problem.

Allen Hall: Well, that’s a part about TTA and I think if I was coming outta the military. I, and I wanted to get into renewables. I wouldn’t necessarily necessarily think Las Vegas. I would think Texas, Oklahoma, maybe Indiana, where there’s wind turbines and there’s solar and there’s batteries.

But the reality is, is that the resources that Nevada is putting into veterans and into supporting you make your facility much more powerful than a lot of other places.

Nick Martocci: Well, and and I kind of remember this conversation we had last year about. [00:15:00] The negative connotation of a two mile square space in Las Vegas.

Right. Right. And, and when people immediately think of Las Vegas, that two mile strip is what they immediately think of.

Allen Hall: Sure.

Nick Martocci: Without understanding. And they’re doing a little homework. And that’s why even, you know, tell people, Hey, come out for a tour, check this out and see where we are. Because we’re right across from Nellis Air Force Base right next to the speedway.

One more exit from my, uh, my training center and you’re out of Las Vegas.

Allen Hall: A lot of people coming up in the industry just don’t think about outside that Midwest, that Texas spot. Mm-hmm. And they need to have their horizons open a little bit and realize that there are other places to get training that are high quality, that are gonna be caring about you as a person and the growth of you.

Think about that when you’re applying to school, Joe. Absolutely. Just take whatever’s the closest. And head toward it.

Nick Martocci: We, we don’t play, and we’re going to treat this just like a career. That’s why [00:16:00] training at our school is a 12 hour training day. It’s not an eight hour day, it’s a 12 hour day.

Allen Hall: Right.

Nick Martocci: And that gets them acclimated to a 12 hour work day.

Allen Hall: But that’s

Nick Martocci: what it’s gonna be. Exactly. So that way when you hit the field and some supervisor says, Hey, it’s gonna be a long day. We’re doing 10 hours today. Ah, part-time job. Got it. You know?

Allen Hall: Right. Right. That’s it. So I, I think there, uh, a lot of people have choices if they’re trying to get into renewables.

Mm-hmm. And they need to be thinking about the choices they make. Technical training Academy should be high up on the list.

Nick Martocci: Absolutely

Allen Hall: high up on the list now, especially with veterans. I mean, that, that’s, that’s a no brainer that Do people get ahold of you? How do they contact you? Where should they start that process?

Should they reach out to you on LinkedIn? Should they go to the website? What’s the best way?

Nick Martocci: Best way is really just to go to the website and, uh. O one of the misnomers I made was the Technical Training Academy, and there, there are so many in the United States, I did not realize that. But if you do Technical Training Academy Las Vegas, it narrows it down to four and [00:17:00] we’re the ones on top.

And it makes it easier. And so if you do, uh, technical Training Academy in the Google Bar and just say, Hey, technical Training Academy, Las Vegas will pop up. Otherwise, on LinkedIn, you’ll find us under Technical Training Academy. Uh, Facebook and Instagram. Were still Tower Training Academy. I’m working on getting that changed over, uh, and then from there, yeah, the, I, I think that’s, oh no, we have a YouTube channel.

Tower Training Academy. We’re also on YouTube. Yeah, YouTube. But as far as reaching us, go on our website. Hit enroll now. Uh, also on our website is our phone number, (725) 272-9495.

Allen Hall: There you go.

Nick Martocci: And so you can just ping that or you can even. Hit up my head of administration at admin1@towertrainingacademy.com.

Allen Hall: Great. So everybody reach out, connect up with Nick, get started, figure out what your future looks like because Nick’s here to help and uh, it’s great to connect with you [00:18:00] again because year it’s something more exciting. Like, alright, this is, this is great. It’s expanding. You’re doing training, you got technicians out in the world, you’re going to the best.

That’s fantastic. I’m always cooking. Congratulations because it’s hard. Your business is hard. Yep. And And that is amazing. It’s amazing.

Nick Martocci: I’ve always got something brewing behind the green curtain.

Allen Hall: Yes.

Nick Martocci: Always got something brewing back there.

Allen Hall: Thank you so much for being on the podcast.