Published

1 year ago

March 13, 2025

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

PEAK Wind Insights with Lene Hellstern

Lene Hellstern, director of engineering at PEAK Wind, discusses the critical importance of thorough technical, commercial, and financial due diligence before investing in wind farm projects. She shares insights from her 24 years of experience on how developers can avoid common pitfalls, manage risks, and build better relationships with turbine manufacturers to ensure more accurate power production estimates.

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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!

Allen Hall: Wind farm developers often face a challenging reality. Projected power output doesn’t match actual performance. This gap can mean millions in lost revenue and unexpected challenges. This week we speak with Lene Hellstern director of engineering at PEAK Wind. With over 24 years of experience analyzing wind projects worldwide, Lene brings crucial insights about what developers need to know before investing millions in wind farm development.

This is a great interview. Stay tuned.

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

Allen Hall: Lene, welcome to the program.

Lene Hellstern: Good to be here.

Allen Hall: We’ve been wanting to talk to you for a long time. So I’m glad you’re on the podcast because your interaction with developers is remarkable and the process that you go through I think is eye-opening. ’cause I don’t see that process happening at all wind sites and in Europe I think it happens more commonly.

But in the United States not so much. Why or when developers not consulting experts like you before, they spend hundreds of millions of dollars. What is the problem with that?

Lene Hellstern: It actually, it does happen, but yeah, sometimes it don’t. And yeah, I might not be the right one of asking to ask this question.

Maybe you should ask them as well why don’t you do it? But I, so for some it’s it’s budget constraints, right? Because you’re a consultant and then they don’t immediately see, how this money that I’m paying the consultant, how does that convert into a gain? Profit. It could be seen as some loose and money just because they’re asking a lot of questions on technical stuff.

It could also be that they are unaware, many are more into the financial part of it. And they have this perception that it’s not needed, the the technical due diligence or the commercial due diligence as the financial, because it’s like buying a car. It is really not like buying a car.

So maybe that is, that’s the reason. And that they think, the wind always blows, so it’s gotta go the turbine. But that’s just not how this world.

Joel Saxum: Would it be fair to say that some of your customers have felt the pain or they’ve gotten burned and that’s why they’re there?

Lene Hellstern: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And you also, we can ask a lot of questions in the process before you buy the turbines. And then we can cover a lot of risks and you can mitigate before everything falls apart. Right. And that gives them a really good advantage, right? They can cover their themself and take all kind of scenarios into consideration, right?

And you get a much, if you ask kindly to the OE em, you do get some answers and you get a better collaboration with the OEM. If you conduct these technical due diligence, if you yell and scream at them, it’s not gonna go well. No. Kill with kindness. That’s much better than threats.

And I want this, and demand that and just ask, right?

Allen Hall: So what are they missing? Generally, when you’re starting a due diligence and you’re walking into a new situation, what are the highlights that a general developer just doesn’t really think about that really needs expertise like yours?

Lene Hellstern: Oh, but they don’t know the consequences of the selections they do in this process.

There is a not lot of things, technical topics that you need to make a decision on what kind of leading its protection do you want? Of course the OEM is guiding you you also on, on various technical topic, but you also as an owner, have some requirements you want fulfill and sometimes they don’t, they’re not even aware of what is it that is important to me.

They don’t know, and then they don’t know the technical consequences that they make. How does that end up, if you, let’s say you, you can some people are not aware that turbines come with a design lifetime, but if you’re smart, you can actually run it longer. But if you prepare early.

Then it doesn’t cost so much to run it longer. And if you run the turbines for a longer time, the, your levelized cost of energy goes down. But they don’t know what they need to do technically and what they need to cover. Let’s say, I can give you an example. Without getting too nerdy. Let’s say that you need, you wanna run your wind farm long, but you know that in this area, in order to get that, the authorities are gonna ask for track record.

They’re gonna, they wanna see data throughout the years from your control monitoring system. But and you can provide that. Perhaps depending on if you, in the contract, made sure that you actually have access to the control monitoring system and that you can download the data because if you don’t have that in the contract and have that settled upfront, it’s gonna, either you won’t get it because it’s not your property, you haven’t made sure that you get it, or the OEM is gonna ask you for money.

So if you have that sorted out before then, if the authorities come and say, Hey, I wanna see the track record for your condition monitoring system, you don’t need to start paying for it. And you don’t need to start digging. And so that, that’s just one example that, where we can help them and say what is it you want?

We can also say what things is it you need to take into consideration?

Joel Saxum: Steer

Lene Hellstern: owner.

Joel Saxum: My question originally is, what percentage would you think your due diligence is commercial versus technical? But at the same time, I think that they fit together because the technical side of things will drive the commercial and the contract side of negotiation.

Lene Hellstern: Maybe it’s one third each. Financial, commercial, and technical.

Joel Saxum: That makes sense.

Lene Hellstern: And can you live with on route one? Yeah. But then it’s gonna, you’re gonna be in pain.

Joel Saxum: Yeah. I boil it down to say if I was building a house, and I think I can generally as a, this is my, me as a wind farm developer, I’m building a house and I generally know how to do everything.

However, I may not be an expert on the foundation, but I tried it myself and now 10 years down the line, I’ve got foundation issues. So while I could have done it, I, there was a lot of things I didn’t know specifically. So that’s when I would call someone like the peak team like you have, because you have the relationships with the OEMs, you know how to deal with them, you know the questions to ask.

You’ve been through these processes a ton of times. So you’re that subject matter expert. But can you focus a little bit and tell us how. The difference between having a good relationship with the OE em or a long standing one. ’cause I know when we were talking off air, you were saying, sometimes I walk into me and they go, oh, le, nice to see you.

Lene Hellstern: It’s a small world actually. And I’ve been in this industry for 20. Four years soon. I know I don’t look that old, but I have and people, go around and you don’t know when you’re meeting this person and then they sit on another side of the table, right? So always keep good relations.

Always ask nicely, give them your arguments because if they understand what you are gonna use the information. For then they are, they might be more willing to give it to you. Let’s take a an example. The failure rates, right? That they really don’t wanna give you that unless they understand what it is you they’re gonna use it for.

Or I would use it for and sometimes I tell ’em, okay, can I please have the failure rates for your main components? And they say, go, no. And I go, okay, that’s fine. But the problem here is then I am gonna guess them. And why not get it from you because. Then in my guessing I would, although I am getting pretty good at it, but I would put in, a, a sort of a risk, right?

So it, I’m automatically pumping it a little bit up, right? Because I’m not really sure, so I need to cover myself here. Where if I get it from the OM and they can tell me why did you come to this conclusion? And I can see, I can think, okay, this is, they’ve done a pretty good job.

They used, the background is God knows how many turbines, so this is, they’ve done their homework. I trust this. Then I, we can use it in our calculations. So that’s that’s and then you don’t get that from them if they don’t trust you and you started yelling and screaming at them.

And also, and when we have contract negotiations, you just you tell them, sometimes we don’t reach an agreement, but, all wanna have things signed at the end of the day. And and tell them why is it you are asking these questions instead of just demanding left and right.

Why is it a value to you? And then make them, give them the arguments for internally in their organization to make sure that you can actually have the information you need.

Allen Hall: Yeah. It, it puts PEAK Wind in a unique position here. And I want to dive into this a little bit deeper. So you’re walking into OEM, big powerful, OEM makes thousands of turbines, has a long service history to developer, which may have a long service history with this.

OE em or may not have any history at all with them. They’re, they may be completely new to the industry. That puts you in a really odd position that you have to navigate both of those conditions and try to get to a good conclusion like that. But PEAK Wind is the one to go do this. And because you bring a lot to the table.

And I’m just, I think we ought just step back for a minute and explain all the things you do when you’re in those discussions interacting between the OEM and the developer. What does that look like?

Lene Hellstern: So if we are in a due diligence, right? We have a of course we don’t almost say we don’t kiss until, right?

So there’s a we don’t say, oh yeah, listen, this client, this happened and this client, you don’t do that, right? Then we did. So we don’t do that. But we do know that there, and you can also see that in the press. There are certain platforms that have certain issues, right? And then we go in. And then let’s say that this OEM has had a history of issues with the cooling system.

And so then we ask questions on the cooling system in this technical due diligence, sometimes you’re lucky and you go to the OEM and you sit with them in meetings and say, and if you are back lucky. You always give them a list of what would I like as a consultant to hear about here?

So they have a chance to prepare, right? If you don’t do that, how on earth can they repair? So then you say, we know that for, that your platform has previous history issues here. So what how, what have you done to improve this? And can we be sure that the turbine is their client is buying, it’s actually taken into consideration, or you’re gonna do a retrofit later down the line?

Or because, the OEMs are not stupid, they will try and fix it. They’re good people so they don’t wanna put anything on the market with flaws and errors in it, right? So then they get mad customers. So that’s where we go in and we we try to see how, how big a risk is this now when you buy this platform and sometimes it’s not, and sometimes it is.

And then we need to find out what, so what are you gonna do? What can the client here expect?

Allen Hall: So you’re trying to understand what the risk is in terms of dollars, I assume, and that, or whatever the currency is at the location, trying to put some numbers to it to say this turbine’s gonna produce this amount of revenue, this turbine’s gonna produce that kind of revenue.

Or These are the problems you’re gonna have if it’s lifetime. You need to build that into your models. That has to be a real eye-opener for developers at times. Because I think a lot of times, like you’re saying, like they, they pick a turbine, they get focused on it, and they don’t realize what that means.

And I’m wondering do, does an operator. Developer changed the turbine they were gonna buy because of this interaction? Because you’re giving ’em some advice and saying maybe this may not be the right turbine for that space.

Lene Hellstern: Yeah. Sometimes they actually have to, right?

Because if the site suitability is completely off if it’s overloaded, then either you’re gonna be faced with extreme containment where you’re losing a lot of production and then, the business case just doesn’t hold water. So always have your site suitability. Everybody. I once heard someone say, yeah, there’s no business reason for site suitability.

Wow. That particular company now has a whole team of site suitability experts. But yes they learned one of the people that learned. But so you in your, in that if you have a good team you always have, you have a selection of turbines you find suitable for the site. And you have a layout.

If you’re smart, you have a layout that fits them all because then you don’t need to wiggle them around all the time, which is not fun because depending on what country you are, wherever you are in the world, there are different permitting procedures, right? So I have destroyed, or I have didn’t destroy, but that was working for an OEM.

But I have actually not well, they. They got the wind direction wrong, so they spaced them too tight. Yeah, so I found that there was an offset on the wind direction and I could say. Yeah you gotta do it. I could do a new sign layout out for you. Or you gotta do it yourself because you you spaced the turbines too tight.

Then they would get overloaded and then they came back and said, yeah, we’re scrapping the project because the, it’s gonna take us five to eight years to get a new permit. So you could, I, to some degree killed it, but. It wasn’t my fault, I would say. And so you wanna have your spacing, right? And then you can’t know what turbines you’re gonna be buying, right?

Because when you do the layout, you are five minutes before. But if you are nice to the OEMs, you’ll know. What’s coming up

Allen Hall: when you get into these discussions between the OEM and the developer and the pieces that they’re typically missing are related to operational losses, clearly and loads. Those are two things they haven’t thought about, and they assume that the OEM has ’em all figured out.

How do you step into that discussion and try to navigate that?

Lene Hellstern: But the OEM you need to have your wind resource assessment done a lot earlier. Be way before you contact OEM and you need to do wind, you need to do production estimates on several different kind of turbines to find out which one is best.

You also need to know about site suitability because you, if you are in complex terrain. Like a mountain or you have forestry, then you need to know what does it do to your turbine? How tight can you space it? So you need to have a prop and you always have site limit limitations part. If it’s flat land in Texas, then you have, I.

Huge sites, right? And also if you have neighboring wind farms. So all of these things need to be mapped out and then you need to look at what is the design of the turbines. And you don’t actually start contacting your, the OEM before you could do it if you have good connection, but you can also, have a tinder and but you don’t.

And OEMs. Calculate, and I’m not saying they’re wrong because then some of them are gonna call me. They calculate when resource assessment on one in one way, and then you would want it in another way. And the reason that the OEMs and without, I’m gonna try not put to put too many words in their mouth for them it is okay if the production is overestimated.

Because that for them, that is just, they just put high loads on the turbines and then they are sure that the turbine is sighted for or suitable for site. And also the OEM does not take account all your other losses. They only take the turbine, they. They don’t take grid losses into consideration. They don’t take substation.

All of these, the losses you have, they don’t take that into consideration because they sometimes, they don’t often know what it is, right? What they’re selling you, the turbine, they are not selling you the grid access.

Joel Saxum: Are they doing that because they’re assuming, basically it’s a horse, a piece, like if you put this turbine in or that turbine in, or that turbine in all of the grid losses and things behind the turbine.

Are equal based on what? It doesn’t matter what turbine you install. Is that why they assume that? Or are they just saying this is our technology, so this is the one that we can do?

Lene Hellstern: No, it’s just this. Yeah, they’re just, this is what we sell you. This is what we know about. Then they, if they started calculating on all other things, then they’re giving you a free service.

Right. That someone else in the market is already, I completely understand it. I’m not criticizing it. They sell a turbine. They sell a power curve on the certain condition conditions, but that’s what they sell.

Allen Hall: That’s the number one complaint in the United States though, is that the power that was predicted from the farm.

Is higher than what actually happens by a several percentage points. Sometimes I’ve heard double digits. At times it seems completely unreasonable. You should not have double digit errors in that calculation. But is that just because they haven’t done a system assessment to the level like PEAK Wind would do to.

Put all your losses in there and tell you what you can deliver to the transmission lines.

Lene Hellstern: First of all, nobody is interested in the right numbers because the people that are developing this is only interested in a high number ’cause that is a greater likelihood of success. I used to be very annoyed about this, but after 24 years, I’m like, yeah, so this, they nobody’s interested in the real number, right?

They want a high number so they can make sure that this pro project is gonna happen. So also it also internally within the, when I worked a lot with wind resource assessment, I would always get complaints. It would be you, it should be nine meters per second. No, but it’s not.

We’ve studied it. We analyzed it, we deducted everything. Your average wind speed is 8.5 just per second. Yeah. But it should be nine. No. Or, why are you giving it such a high grid loss? Because the grid’s gonna be congested. We are, look, we are looking at 25 years. It is already starting.

They’re starting to contain, there is no plan of building out the grid anytime soon. It’ll be worse. Your grid containment. So I’m not gonna tell you don’t have anything because you will. Always, I also worked as a developer. You, if you wanna not please anyone, go into wind resource assessment and production estimates, because they’re always gonna be unhappy.

Joel Saxum: Okay. So you’re, you guys operate your course at Danish company, but you’ve done projects all over the world in the states, in Europe, offshore, onshore. Great. So do you see a difference in where the demand is coming from your services? Say. Is it partially coming from the fin financiers of the projects?

The insurers? Or is it purely developers, or is that geographically dependent?

Lene Hellstern: We have a lot of different clients, so we don’t believe in putting all the eggs in one basket, so we have financial institution that are looking to acquire a part of a offshore wind farm somewhere in the world. We have developers.

That they are looking they wanna develop projects or they wanna sell them. We have utilities. It, it’s different, right? It’s also some have the the capacity to do this kind of work. Others have already done it, but they want a third pair of eyes, right? So that’s fair enough.

And then, we try, we, of course, I’m not, I’m gonna get so hammered if I say we don’t try and please anyone. We always try to please our clients, but we also try to be honest and say, this, the production estimates, you have forgotten this, and that. Or you, there, there are some gray areas here that you’ve gotta make a guess.

I, and your guess is a bit too low. If you take these things into consideration so it can be a lot of different clients and that’s the beauty of being a consultant. ’cause I’ve been an OEM, I’ve been a developer, I’ve been working for utility. But as a consultant you, it’s, and then you try and find out what is it they want?

What do they need? Um, and then we try and help them and please them. But we also try to be honest so they understand what is they’re venturing into. Then they can make the right, we dress ’em up so they make the right decisions, right? Make them aware of the risks.

Allen Hall: So that honesty is why you would get a hold of PEAK Wind because you’d rather know now and get an outside independent assessment before you spent the a hundred, 200, 400, $500 million on a project and then learn afterwards that, lene was right. You want to know that upfront because she does know what she’s talking about. She does. However, that history and PEAK Wind is full of people like that, that know wind and know where the problems lie and can give you that information upfront in a project. And that’s why we, that’s why we had Lene on today is because she’s just so full of knowledge and experience and there’s a lot of developers that don’t have that.

And it’s hard to find it lene, how do people get ahold of PEAK Wind and get you on board to help them through this process?

Lene Hellstern: You just call us. We’ll help you but we won’t, we won’t always say what you wanna hear, but we will say what you need to hear. Yeah, it’s so you just contact us.

We, we are on LinkedIn. We have a webpage. Yeah. Just reach out.

Allen Hall: The website is peak-wind.com and PEAK Wind is based in Denmark. Adjust accordingly on your two time zone and the US Exactly.

Lene Hellstern: And Korea, Taiwan, uk I forget someone. Yeah. Yeah. Hamburg, Germany. Two places in Denmark. Yeah. Yes. So we are very much global.

We are like 211 currently. And it’s not just leaning. Who’s doing this work, but they, I have a whole army of good people behind me helping with this. ’cause I am not the specialist on everything. We pull in the specialist on the, on different topics like whether it’s components. And I am not the specialist on commercial or financial.

I’m the director of engineering, so I that’s my area. And then. I pull in my people on the different specialist topics, and we would love to help.

Allen Hall: Having those talented people in one place is what you’re paying for, and that’s why PEAK Wind is so important to the industry. So reach out to PEAK Wind and you can just go to the website, it’s PEAK-Wind.com.

You can find Lene on LinkedIn and contact her and she’ll get you started. But the honesty is. Part of the equation. And Lene, thank you so much for being on the podcast. Great guest. We love to have you back on, so you’re always welcome to come back onto the podcast.

Lene Hellstern: Sure. This was super fun. I just hope somebody got smarter by listening to this.

https://weatherguardwind.com/peak-wind-insights-with-lene-hellstern/

Renewable Energy

3S Lift Adds a Rescue Stretcher to Climb Auto System

Published

8 hours ago

June 18, 2026

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

3S Lift Adds a Rescue Stretcher to Climb Auto System

Giovan Scialdone, president of 3S Lift Americas, joins to discuss 30,000 Climb Auto System installs and a new lift-mounted rescue stretcher.

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: Gio, welcome back to the program.

Gio Scialdone: Hey, thanks, Allen.

Allen Hall: So a lot’s happened over the past year since we last spoke with you at 3S Lift. Yeah. And there’s all kinds of new technology and improvements and the- The expansion of the Climb Auto system in the United States is remarkable. Yeah. How many systems do you have installed in North America?

Gio Scialdone: Yeah, I appreciate that. I mean, it’s, it’s… The, the pride that we take in, in those numbers are, are serious. We, we feel, uh, a great responsibility to help technicians, to help our customers operate more, uh, more efficiently. We have 30,000 installed.

Allen Hall: Wow.

Gio Scialdone: So yeah, last year was a busy year. We installed close to 8,000, uh, in North America, so a bit in Canada as well.

Um, [00:01:00] yeah, it’s… And, you know, before we get into some more numbers too, a funny story for you, a Massachusetts native- Right … or lived in Massachusetts- Long time … for a period of time. Uh, Hoosac Wind Farm, you know the Hoosac Wind Farm. Oh, yeah, yeah,

Allen Hall: I can see it out my front door.

Gio Scialdone: This is what’s great about this industry and being at this conference.

Um, I ran into… At, at one point in time working for GE a long time ago, I was a site construction manager for Hoosac. I ran into my EHS safety manager, who I haven’t seen in 14 years-

Allen Hall: Wow …

Gio Scialdone: uh, who now works for another prominent, uh, company, uh, in the industry, and, uh, she remembered the name of my dog that- Really?

I used to take to the site as a- Oh,

Allen Hall: wow.

Gio Scialdone: So, uh, you know, it’s good to be here, see you, and see, see, you know, lots of former colleagues, so,

Allen Hall: you know. Well, it’s a small world in wind.

Gio Scialdone: It’s a very small world. And, you know, we’re, we’re a company that, um, you know, again, we, we, we have a unique product, and there, there are some other companies that are, um, also coming out with a product quite similar, and we, [00:02:00] we appreciate that competition.

Sure. In fact, I think, you know, we spend a lot of our time trying to, uh, sell our customers on the value that the ClimbAuto system is a need and not a nice to have, and I think having some competition with a similar ladder access product further, uh, maybe pushes that point to, to, to be true. So, um, you know, it’s good to be here and see some expansion in, in our little, uh, you know, ladder lift space.

Allen Hall: Well, I think it shows the work that 3S has done to demonstrate the value of that system. I remember several years ago, I think when I first talked to you, there wasn’t a lot of adoption, and you were… And the operators were thinking, “Do I really need this?” But the reality was that the technicians loved it.

They improved performance. They had technicians using those towers and wanted to work on those specific towers. Yeah. And, and then, uh, just kind of the flood happened. It, it was everybody was testing the [00:03:00] waters. You were basically installing test systems- Yeah … or sort of sample system to try it. Yeah.

Everybody loved it, and then boom, you’re up to 30,000 units.

Gio Scialdone: I, I think, I think a part of that too to add on is you, you have to have a quality product.

Allen Hall: Oh, sure. It has to work. For, for… It has to work. Right.

Gio Scialdone: That’s the most important thing. Yeah. Um- The th- the, the, the value and the function in theory makes sense to lots of people, but does it work and is it reliable?

And I think having been here nine years and, and, you know, the first three years we only had 500 units installed. Yeah. So it’s really the last three or four years that have expanded our, our installation base. And I think a lot of that is, you know, thank, you know, we’ve got a great team behind it. You know, we’ve got 70 technicians, and we’ve got a sales team, and an engineering team, and, um, you know, a project management team.

So we, we’ve, we’ve staffed up as, as you need to. But the product we’ve, we, we really believe has, um, you know, been our best [00:04:00] salesperson. You know, it takes some service. That’s one thing I wanted to, to let you know, too. You know, in the early days, we- a lot of our customers were servicing our lifts. Sure.

Right, yeah. And we still, um, uh, promote that if they would like to. Uh, annual inspection, you know, 30 minutes a year, um, that kind of pre-use inspection of one or two minutes before you ride it is- Sure … is, is, uh- Yeah, yeah … required. But now we’ve got a team of 20 to 25 technicians who their only job is to go around and, and service these lifts.

So- Wow … we’re proud now that, you know, the oldest lifts are nine years. Oh, wow. And they’re still working very, very well as designed. You know, no, no major correctives, no motor replacements. So, you know, stand behind the product and, and, you know, service it, and servicing our customers is really what we’re, we’re proud to, to, to show.

Allen Hall: Well, that was always the hard part early on. Um, my recollection was I could install this system, and yes, I could help my technicians, but am I fixing it, replacing it? The, the, the quality was the question mark at the moment.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: [00:05:00] But you’ve really hammered that, and I think 3S has done a good job of mainta- maintenance and inspections and just delivering a quality product.

That’s why I think you’ve seen the growth as rapidly as you have, and the price point’s right, too.

Gio Scialdone: The price point has to be right. I think, you know, um, we’ve– we, we are offering some additional, let’s call them, like, support services. So we’ve got an online store where you can come and buy spare parts. You can buy every spare part that you need on our online store.

Allen Hall: Nice.

Gio Scialdone: You know, accessories are required, fall arresters and battery kits and things like that, that even if you’re an ISP or, or a third party, uh, not the owner per se, you, you need that, that, that equipment. In addition to the online store, we- we, last year we launched, uh, an online training academy. So what’s…

You know, it’s a very simple system to use. We’ve seen it. I’ve seen it. Used it.

Allen Hall: Yeah.

Gio Scialdone: Um, but we need to make sure as an industry and as a company that we take responsibility to make sure as, as best we can that every [00:06:00]person that uses this uses it appropriately and has the intelligence and the knowledge and skills to, um, troubleshoot basic things or perform safety evacuation features.

So we’ve got an online training, um, uh, academy that we launched last year, and that’s been going well too. So more information we feel is better, uh, for our customers, for our technicians. Sure. You know. Um, so that’s been fantastic to see a lot more activity and customer… Again, a really small, you know, $200 per, per training course, and the certificate’s good for two years.

You know, um, a robust course for an hour or two. It’s worth it.

Allen Hall: Well, it’s a reasonable price for an excellent product. Yeah. And that’s been the key for a long time. Yeah. Opening up the ability to get spare parts online, that’s huge. I know when you talk to operators, what’s the pain point? I have to call somebody- Yeah

somewhere far away to try to get a part. Sure. It’s gonna take six months to get it.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: Getting it online is the way- Yeah … that they wanna do it. [00:07:00] So it’s a lot of smart moves to be the support part of, of that system.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah. We’ve come… I’m, I’m smiling because in Chicago, uh, maybe seven years ago, our, our first spill- spare parts process was-

uh, my office had a closet that I housed all the spare parts.

Allen Hall: Yeah.

Gio Scialdone: You know? And, and when I needed to ship out something, I put it in a box and gave it to the, to, like, the building secretary, you know? That’s how it worked. And now we’re, we’re a little more sophisticated than that. We’ve- Y- you got a

Allen Hall: massive organization

Gio Scialdone: behind it We’ve got a 40,000 square foot warehouse that we’re, we’re really proud of, and a great team behind it to perform the logistics and track everything and…

You know. So yeah, we’ve, we’ve come a long way, and our customers are helping us try to get better as well, you know. There’s still, there’s still a long way to go. Our objective as a company is to eliminate climbing, Alan. And it- And, and, and you know, I think there’s not much pushback, frankly.

Allen Hall: Not today.

Right? Three years ago, a lot of pushback.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah. Yeah. I think, um… And what I mean, too, is, like, I think- From a, uh, a [00:08:00] value perspective, there’s no pushback. There’s still a budget perspective. Sure. And I think the challenges we’re finding still are if you’re at a wind farm and you have blade issues or, or, or drive train issues, uh, you might need to spend your dollars there before you spend them on a lift, and we, we, we understand and respect that.

And so we’re working together with customers to try to come up with creative commercial solutions, be it, uh, you know, deferred payment models or multi-year, look at that as a, a capital cost plus some operational cost. Smart. Defer some of that capital, um, to, to sort of reduce that first year burden, right?

Allen Hall: Yeah. So- That’s the

Gio Scialdone: scary

Allen Hall: part, right? They, they… The lump sum- It’s a big budget item. Yeah … is always an item, and they, especially in today’s world where we got gearbox and blade issues, they don’t want to spend on something that’s not directly there because it’s the, that’s what- Yeah … produces power.

Gio Scialdone: Right.

Allen Hall: But technicians working on the turbines also produce power. That’s a great point.

Gio Scialdone: And

Allen Hall: you, and you need them, they go up and down- Yeah. That’s a good point … and sometimes you need them to go up and down a lot. Yeah. And if you don’t [00:09:00] wanna wear out those technicians, the, the lift is the way, the climb model system is the way to go.

Right. It just makes… In today’s world, not having it, you’re the odd one out because most sites have some, if not all the turbines with the climb model system.

Gio Scialdone: There’s a, a… It reminded me of a, I talked to a customer today who said, you know, lots of these sites are clustered with phases. Uh, this particular customer retrofitted, uh, one of the two phases at their site.

They’re split, let’s call it 50 turbines each or so, um, maybe two years ago, and then their struggle is they haven’t yet got the budget to do the second phase. Now, it’s the same group of

Allen Hall: technicians-

Gio Scialdone: Yeah … that work on both phases. So she, she explained to me that every morning when they go in and they kinda see which, which turbine they’re going to, there’s a, there’s a few of them going, “Yeah.”

And there’s a couple other ones that are like, “Ah,” you know? Yeah. So there’s a real like… And I th- and I believe, you know, while that’s kind of a, an anecdotal kind of funny story, there’s, there’s, there’s real objective measures that you [00:10:00] can look at to say that it is, it is- correlated, hard to prove causation, but likely that those technicians who are climbing are gonna be less efficient at the same task than those who are not climbing, right?

Yeah. And, and the customer knows that. And so, um, you know, we’ve gotten to that point as an industry that we’re, again, we’re not arguing the, the value too much anymore. That’s good. It’s more about finding the solution for the right, at the right time. Pre-repower, do we do it pro- post-repower? You know, those questions are being asked.

Um, you know, it makes more sense potentially, if you will repower in a year, to put that in that budget. Um, so we’re seeing lots of that activity, especially as the lead up to this July 4th, uh, sa- uh, start a construction repower- Right … cliff.

Allen Hall: Yeah. Are, are you getting a lot of inquiries about that? Like, we wanna book a contract, try to get before that July date?

Gio Scialdone: Yeah, look, one of the interesting things is, you know, to qualify for the PTC by [00:11:00] July 4th, you need to start construction.

Allen Hall: That’s right.

Gio Scialdone: Um, or, and you can do that in a couple different ways, right? Right. And we are having customers who are using our lifts as a start of physical work on site.

Allen Hall: Oh,

Gio Scialdone: that’s so smart.

So they’re installing lifts- To start that process and show a continuous effort on site. It’s on-site work. Yes, it is. Uh, we have, you know, pri- uh, PWA, prevailing wage apprentice- Right … qualified- Sure … technicians in our program, if that’s something that’s required- Yeah … which a lot of times it is- It is

nowadays on these, a lot of these sites. So, um, yeah, we’re offering both of those things to customers. It is an interpretation. There are some customers who aren’t, um, but, but there are, there are those that, that do see the lift as a great tool for them to start that, that clock.

Allen Hall: Right. So- Because the parts are there, you’re ready to go.

You can get them- Yeah … installed and- Yeah … unlike other components of a wind turbine- That might

Gio Scialdone: have longer lead time …

Allen Hall: that will have longer lead times. Right. If you’re doing main bearings or something of that sort- Right … it’s gonna be several months before you get those assets on site and can [00:12:00] start working them.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah. And you’ve got three months until July 4th,

Allen Hall: right? Right. You gotta go.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah, you gotta go.

Allen Hall: Right. And that- You gotta go … I think that’s, that’s the key to all this. Yeah. Boy, that, that’s genius. I’m, I’m glad that people- … are thinking outside the box.

Gio Scialdone: We are too. Our customers are creative.

Allen Hall: Yeah.

Gio Scialdone: And that’s good.

We’re happy to support that, at times.

Allen Hall: So there’s, there’s some new technology at 3S in- involving evacuation and- Yeah … you know, the, one of the most, uh, critical pieces of being a technician is working safe, but occasionally things happen. Mm-hmm. And there’s a lot of ways to get technicians from the nacelle downtower.

Some of them involve tossing them over side and roping them down, which can be kind of extreme, honestly. Mm-hmm. And a, a lot of technicians do get hurt in not necessarily life-threatening ways- Right … but in ways where it makes it really hard to kind of get them up and down- Safely, yeah … the, the tower safely, right.

So 3S has been thinking about this for a while, and now you have a, a new product.

Gio Scialdone: We do. We have a rescue stretcher, uh, which has been in development for about a year or [00:13:00] so. We’ve tested it in the field. Um, yeah, the, the climb onto system with all its functions, uh, has not been a rescue system. Right. Right?

Um, so what, what we’ve been doing is if, if there is an incident in the tower, you’re utilizing a, a, a, one of the many rescue devices that are in the industry. Sure. Now, w- with the stretcher, uh, this is a, a device that attaches to the ClimbAuto System and uses the ClimbAuto System to safely bring the person down.

Um, it can be installed by, with one, uh, rescuer. So one person can fix this to the rail. It has pulley, uh, systems to bring the person up onto and attached to the ClimbAuto System, and then send down. Now, so then you’re, you’re, you’re immobilized, right? So we secure your head, your feet, your body. Um, and to your point earlier, yes, it’s in, in the event that an injury occurs [00:14:00] and you have, let’s call it some time, 10 to 15 minutes of setup time, ’cause that’s what it will take- Sure

then this is a great product. And the idea would be, you know, one per truck, similar to a rescue device. Um, you know, and then, you know, you can, can get it up and down the tower pretty easily. It’s, it’s light. It, the package is like a, it’s like a tent bag. It folds up into, like, a bag of a tent, if you picture that.

Um, it maybe weighs, like, 15 pounds. It’s quite light. Oh, that’s good. Yep, yep. You know, ’cause there’s no long rope, right? So there’s no, like, hundred-meter rope that you need, which is the, the heavy stuff. Right. Um, and, you know, so you’re using the lift. So the, the weight of the, the system, the stretcher itself, is quite light.

So we’re excited. We’ve got a few customers that have demoed it. And, uh, yeah, we’re, we’re, we’re looking to continue to improve the, the, the, the features that we offer. Well,

Allen Hall: yeah. If, if there’s 30,000 ClimbAuto Systems out there- Mm … there should be these rescue kits along in the trucks- Yeah … because you just don’t know.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: Right? And guys get hurt.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: They [00:15:00] dislocate their shoulders. They’re dislocating their knees. Yeah. It, it’s a hard task. It is. Uh, you used to climb and do that job. It is. You know that- It is … there’s, there’s things that happen uptower that it makes it hard to get down.

Gio Scialdone: You know, I remember doing some training w- where a lot, I mean, we all have, at some point, maybe done some rescue training and, you know, if you’re in a traditional uh, auto descent or sort of rescue device, you may be banging against the tower wall or the ladder- Yep

potentially causing further injury. The benefit of this system is, is that, you know, you’re stable on the lift as you go down. Um, so yeah, it’s a little, um… We, we feel is gonna be helpful f- for the sites that have, for sure, climb auto systems, and again- … it’ll take some training.

Allen Hall: Sure.

Gio Scialdone: Right? Sure. It’ll take some training to, to…

Just like any, any rescue device will take. Um, but we, we see some value in the future that, again, it’s adding… It’s another tool, uh, for customers- Yeah … to consider to keep their people safer.

Allen Hall: Yeah.

Gio Scialdone: You know? So.

Allen Hall: I, I, I- Yeah. I see a lot more operators now being very proactive about safety.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: And if I can have a simple tool- Yeah

that [00:16:00] makes life easier just in case, ’cause things happen, and you wanna be ready for it, something in, in the back of the truck makes infinite sense and is a, a smart way to handle it. Because the thing about tower heights today, we’re above 100 meters on a lot of towers.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: And that’s a long way to get lifted down.

Speaker: That’s

Gio Scialdone: true. Yeah. That’s a, it’s a… And, and, you know, and if you’re in a condition, a wind condition where it-

Allen Hall: Which is where these

Gio Scialdone: turbines

Allen Hall: are,

Gio Scialdone: yeah … towers sway, yeah. Then, then it’s- It’s- … even harder and need multiple people. You know, so again, in these remote areas where more and more turbines are being located as new construction, m- way more remote, uh, y- your, your, the next team of two technicians may be a, an hour away.

Probably, yes. Right? Worst case, it could be an hour away. Yeah. Oh,

Allen Hall: yeah.

Gio Scialdone: And so as a team of two, you know, to be able to rescue you and safely bring you down, it could be critical. It could be critical. It

Allen Hall: will be.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah. Yeah, because there’s not gonna be a third or fourth person to come assist us

Allen Hall: for an hour,

Gio Scialdone: you know?

So yeah, it’s an exciting… You know, [00:17:00] we, we’re, we’re trying to do, you know, uh, add-ons to the product to, uh, you know… We, we’ve modified some things over the years. We’ve got a new battery kit style, uh, to improve functionality. Clip-on battery as opposed to a plug-in. Um, you know, we’ve added a lot of different safety features over the years, like, um, uh, simultaneous handle switches.

Right, yeah. So, you know, we’re, we’re trying to avoid, uh, a misuse of, of, uh, one hand at a time or no hands. Um, so there’s, there’s lots of features that we have, uh, added and also are able to, when we go service these t- towers- Bring the add-on at no cost if we’re performing the service for the customer. So we’re gonna upgrade your software, so to speak- Sure

to the newest and latest, greatest software, um, so that, you know, you can be safer than, than you were maybe a few years ago.

Allen Hall: Oh, yeah. But that’s why you buy a 3S Climboto system. Ouch. Is because you know that those upgrades are coming. Yeah. And they’re- Yeah. You guys are not sitting still. You don’t have- No

you hadn’t device- No … [00:18:00] created a device 10 years ago and haven’t changed it. Yeah. It’s evolved every single year- It has … that I’ve talked to you. Yeah. And every single year it’s safer, more reliable- Yeah … does more features, and the technicians love it.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah.

Allen Hall: Absolutely love it.

Gio Scialdone: I credit our, you know, our company is, is…

This is our, this is our, uh, our passion, right? So, like, we’ve, we’ve been in this business for, for 20-plus years. In the US, we’ve been in it for nine and, you know, we’re not, we’re, we’re not going anywhere. No. You know, notwithstanding, um, uh, any, any, any political issues, we’re gonna ride through, so, so is everybody here, you know?

Sure. Yeah. We’re, we’re, we’re in this and, you know, our mindset is, again, to eliminate climbing and, and do the best we can to keep people safer and have turbines run more efficiently.

Allen Hall: So if you’re an operator or a wind farm asset manager or site supervisor- Yeah … at a, at a wind farm and you don’t have the Climboto system yet Who do you call?

Where do you go to get started?

Gio Scialdone: Yeah, you can, you can definitely get us on the [00:19:00]website. You know, there’s a Get Info button that still goes directly to me if you’re gonna say, “Hey, can I get a quote on this?” So, you know, we’ve got five salespeople. Uh, you can certainly ask your management team because there’s a l- strong likelihood that we’ve been in touch with them.

We, we visit sites. You know, we visited 200 sites last year. So our… We’re out. We, we… You know, if, uh, if we haven’t visited you, let us know. But, um, you know, yeah, you can definitely reach us on, on the web or, uh, you know, we’ve got a phone number as well on there, so.

Allen Hall: Yeah, it’s easy to reach out. Yeah. Just look up 3S Lift.

Climb Model System’s another quick way, and if you Google that you’ll get to the 3S Lift website, and you can find all the cool features, and, and the new devices, and you can find your parts and everything you want right there. It’s, it’s amazing the growth and, and the, and the, uh, adoption of that system.

It’s, it’s great to hear. It’s one of those things that when it’s a real success story. Yeah. And I, I know you’re, you’re really close to it of course.

Gio Scialdone: Yeah, I know.

Allen Hall: Yeah. But from the outside looking in, it’s [00:20:00] amazing.

Gio Scialdone: We’re proud of

Allen Hall: the team. 500 turbines to 3,000, that’s a lot.

Gio Scialdone: It is. We’re proud of the team. I’m, I’m grateful to the customer base that, that have seen this, this value, you know, and recognize it.

Um, and you know, not only for the soft sell, that it helps people and the morale, and, you know, there is a, a, a, a harder to measure injury improvement factor.

Allen Hall: Yeah.

Gio Scialdone: Um, but, but there’s absolutely some objective measures. We have sites that before the lifts were installed were at 95% availability, and now they’re at 96.2.

Now, correlation and causation aren’t the same thing, but we, we believe, and we means the industry I think at this point, especially to see competitors come in, I think that further, uh, drives home the idea that this is the right thing to do, to stop climbing and, and help your t- technicians be more efficient, effective.

So yeah, we’re, we’re proud of it and, um, you know, we’re looking forward to being here for another nine years.

Allen Hall: Absolutely. Yeah. Gio, so good to see you. Congratulations on everything. Thanks, Allen. And yeah, [00:21:00] good luck this year. I know you’re gonna have a l- a lot more growth, so- Thanks … congratulations.

Gio Scialdone: Appreciate the time.

3S Lift Adds a Rescue Stretcher to Climb Auto System

Renewable Energy

Dear MAGA

Published

9 hours ago

June 18, 2026

Alice Rush

To be fair, the greedy pigs and the hateful morons in the United States didn’t vote specifically for corruption, or higher gas prices due to an illegal and pointless war.

All the greedy pigs wanted was tax breaks and legislation that would help their business interests thrive at the expense of the wellbeing of every else on the planet.

All the hateful morons wanted was punishment for everyone but white Christian straight males.

No one wanted incompetent fools running our nation. But that’s exactly what they got.

Dear MAGA

Renewable Energy

Investors Wanted for Personal Aircraft

Published

23 hours ago

June 17, 2026

Alice Rush

Doroni Aerospace says:

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