Published

2 years ago

June 27, 2024

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

R&D Test Systems: Digital Twins for Wind Turbine Testing

Allen Hall and Joel Saxum interview Dr. Elif Ecem Bas, a PhD project engineer at R&D Test Systems in Denmark. Dr. Bas discusses how R&D Test Systems is leveraging digital twin technologies and hybrid testing to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of testing wind turbine components, particularly pitch bearings.

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!

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Allen Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I’m your host, Allen Hall, along with my co host, Joel Saxum. As wind turbines grow in size and complexity, testing these components has become increasingly expensive and time consuming. To address these challenges, R&D Test Systems is leveraging digital twin technologies to improve the efficiency of their test bed.

Benches, ultimately reducing testing time and costs. And if you don’t already know, R&D Test Systems is a leading company in the wind energy industry, providing testing solutions for wind turbine components on a massive scale. Today we have the pleasure of speaking with Ecem Bas, a PhD project engineer.

At R&D Test Systems in Denmark, Dr. Bas earned her PhD in structural engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno, and is currently focusing on digital twin technologies at R&D Test Systems. In this interview, we will delve into the applications of digital twin technology and wind turbine component testing and learn more about Dr.

Bas’s work in this cutting edge field. Ecem, Welcome to the program.

Elif Ecem Bas: Thank you. And thanks a lot for the introduction.

Allen Hall: So there’s a lot to learn here because Joel and I have been following the digital twin saga over the last several years because you see a lot of of news articles and information about digital twins and OEMs or have been looking at it and a lot of smaller companies have been trying to prove out digital twins.

But we haven’t seen a lot of it being applied in a place where I think it’s important, which is in the testing phase. And R&D Test Systems if you haven’t worked with R&D Test Systems, build some of the largest pieces of test equipment in the world to test generators up to 25 megawatts and all kind of blades, just insanely big things.

So what is the benefit of using Digital Twin on such large test equipment?

Elif Ecem Bas: Let’s come one step back. As you mentioned in your introduction. Testing is necessity for all the wind turbine components and their subcomponents as well. This is required by the standards and this is required by the design and also the manufacturing.

So we will not get rid of testing. Testing is very important. But as the wind turbines are getting bigger and bigger, this time to test these components takes also a lot of time. And for as an example for a blade to test the Fatigue test to make a fatigue test for a blade. It takes one year or more than a year to do the saw

Joel Saxum: Constant movement.

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah, exactly to see all the damages through the blade. You have to do that and also for a highly accelerated lifetime testing of an assault. This also takes six and eight months and also testing this. These are large facilities, right? And testing this will also cost money. tens of million euros bought to establish and run this.

And this leads, of course, longer time to market. For new and more powerful wind turbines. In detail systems, we are trying to develop digital tools to overcome these challenges and to have these turbines to roll onto the market. So and also yeah, cut cost on it. And what we are using digital twins in the testing, it is very necessary because we would like to reduce the cost of the down time in the testing itself, in the test execution itself.

Allen Hall: So there are portions of testing, from my understanding, and I’m an electrical engineer and I’m a mechanical engineer, but I’ve spent about a lot of structural testing. Those tests take a long time, they’re very expensive, but sometimes the result we get out of those tests isn’t very useful in the real world.

On the other side of this, you’ve got two problems. One is that, does the test match what’s happening in service? That’s a really great question. The second half is, how much do you know about this product before you start testing it? Or are you testing the way? You’re touching the engineering aspects properly to evaluate that for the real world.

And I think you, you run into two problems here and I want to understand this part first, which is you model the component, but you don’t model all aspects of it. And I want to, I Can you walk through that a little bit, like what you’re trying to do with a device, a blade, or a gearbox, or anything else, a pitch bearing?

Elif Ecem Bas: As you mentioned, there are two aspects. So in the component test, we just take one component and test it, right? And with our, Digital twin technologies, we focus on both simulating the complete system, whereas we only test one component and model the remaining parts. So this is one thing, and we call this hybrid testing because one part is tested experimentally, whereas the remaining components are modeled numerically.

And we do this in In a closed loop system where we share at every time step, we share the commands and feedbacks with the test bench. So this is one aspect where we test. Only one component, let’s say it is the pitch bearing, and model the remaining part, which is the blade and the hub and the other parts, the other blades.

Allen Hall: Alright, so that’s interesting. That’s a complicated model though, right? When you try to do that.

Elif Ecem Bas: Exactly.

Allen Hall: So you have to simplify it so you can model it. How are you finding those sort of the key characteristics so you can model it on a test bench properly?

Elif Ecem Bas: Why we do hybrid testing? Hybrid testing is to get the both advantages from the experimental world and from the analytical world.

So we do hybrid testing for the components that we cannot model properly. In this case, it is, we choose that it is the pitch bearing because it’s very hard to model.

Joel Saxum: Makes sense. Yeah. Yeah.

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah. And also the pitch bearing itself. So bearings are designed to roll, right? But the pitch bearing is rolling a little bit and then exposed to the bending moments for their lifetime.

So it’s against to its own nature. So this is why also predicting the failure mechanisms of the pitch bearing is a bit hard. Another thing is, when it is failed, it is very hard to backtrace what was the cause of this failure, because you cannot model it properly. So what we are doing is, since this part is hard to model, we put it in an experimental setup.

And the blade and the remaining part, the other kinematics are relatively easier to model.

Joel Saxum: That’s a good word. Relatively. Yeah.

Elif Ecem Bas: And so it took that part and we use that simplified models to apply more realistic loading scenarios to the pitch bearing. In order to get its behavior.

Joel Saxum: A question here like Allen said earlier pitch bearings is a headache for, man, what would you say, 90 percent of the people we talk to, Allen? Oh, easily, yes. When we’re thinking about you guys advancing the testing mechanism for us, because it’s, it is, just, if you picture it in your head, It is, a bearing is designed for that rolling surface, however, this not only is exposed to the root bending moment of the blades, basically, on a fulcrum, pulling and pushing on it, but it’s also having gravitational loads at the exact same time, going up, sideways, down so you have this really complex load scenario.

You guys coming forth with something that could hopefully accelerate lifetime testing,

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah. Also, we are looking into testing extreme cases in this scenario. So picking up extreme wind load event and test this and hopefully see the development of a failure with the test.

Joel Saxum: That with everybody with pitch bearings.

If you talk to anybody in the manufacturing sector, it’s it’s really hard to do an accelerate at any kind of lifetime testing. For that pitch, because it isn’t when you look at it in the crate, right? That is a robust piece of metal. That’s a big, bad thing, right? If anybody’s ever seen one of these it’s impressive how big it is and how heavy it is and how much steel there is.

But to test that you can’t you can’t do a life cycle test in six months on that thing. It’s just not possible.

Elif Ecem Bas: Exactly. And also what. We hear from the test centers that they cannot see the failures with this highly accelerated lifetime test on it. So what we are looking into, okay, we have this extreme load case scenario.

Can we apply this with hybrid testing and can we see the development of the failure of this component?

Allen Hall: Let me ask you about the complexities of pitch bearing, because I think Joel brought it up at a really high level, but I want to focus in, drill down to how complex this is. So you have this massively long blade, right?

The blades are getting longer, so the center of gravity is moving further and further out, the center of lift on them is moving also, the blades are flexing, right? Then you got the gravitational pull. piece. But on top of that, now you’ve added a control system in the turbine, which is pitching the blades as they rotate around the 360.

So you have this, and you’re not necessarily sure what the OEM is doing with their pitch control system. That’s not widely disclosed as to say it that way. So when you’re looking for failure modes on a, particularly a new blade with a new control system, On mostly an existing bearing structure, you have a lot of unknowns there.

And we have, as we have, Joel has pointed out, we have a lot of operators around the world that are complaining about pitch for each breaking and yet they passed all the required tests for to get type certification. So now we’re going back and this is where I think the brain powered R&D Test Systems really matters here.

Now you’re able to apply some knowledge because now we see these failures. And then can you model those failures? Are you able to digital twin the failure mode and then place that back into the new testing regime?

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah, first of all, we have to see that if we can track these failures with the hybrid testing while applying these extreme load scenarios.

And as you mentioned, in our, now in our test configuration, we have two actuators, to apply the bending moment of the blade. And we also have the third actuator to model the pitch angle, to control the pitch angle. So we are also making it yeah, rotate to pitch, and then to apply the bending moments. We are But these cal these are all coming from the simulation world, so all these bending moment calculations are coming from the simulation world of this blade.

So we calculate a bending moment at the blade, which will be applied to the pitch. And we apply this in the test bench itself.

Allen Hall: So let me ask, let me go down this rabbit hole a little bit further. Because it’s a very complicated mechanical problem, right? It’s probably one of the most difficult mechanical problems out there today because of the quantities of product and the cost involved.

You have this, you have a fixed hub diameter for the most part as the blades get longer. So the load paths in that are are unique. There’s not they’re not simple, right? So when you’re creating a piece of test equipment to go evaluate and in this hybrid condition, I’m trying to go through the thought process of what R&D Test Systems is trying to do here because you have so many variables you have this I’ll call it a black box of control system like there’s inputs and there’s outputs and so you’re looking at the outputs into the bearing How do you then when you go to create that piece of test equipment to test it?

determine how these failures are occurring. Do you just, do you design the equipment based upon that control system, that digital twin?

Elif Ecem Bas: So for this specific case, it is slightly different. We have this research and development project with the university, Aarhus University and FORCE Technology, and Together with this team, we developed this hybrid testing framework for pitch pairings.

All of us together are, is designed this let’s say test setup. But this is not the similar ones that we develop here. We usually develop large scale test benches. This is considerably small, and we would like to get yeah, apply the know how and see the results of hybrid testing.

And what we are also helping with our customers here, as you said, there are so many people are involved. So the the control system of the, uh, OEM is their own IP protected and the blade is maybe the blade model is that they don’t want to share.

Allen Hall: Definitely IP.

Elif Ecem Bas: Exactly. It’s also even the wind load could be an IP issue.

So what we are also trying to to give our customers as a service is how to combine these pieces together.

Allen Hall: Okay, that’s brilliant. All right, so then that drives the cost down because you’re applying so much knowledge ahead of time. So when you get to the test scenario, you know what you’re looking for already.

These are the features. These are the failure modes because of the way the control system is designed and operating. This is how we’re going to test these bearings in a real world scenario. How much cost reduction and time shortening does that does that, does occur because of your digital twin?

Elif Ecem Bas: Another aspect of digital twin, as I just mentioned, we are trying to provide a platform for our customers to put their models into. Together. So it’s not that high, only the hybrid testing that we are focusing on, but we are also focusing on combining different simulation models. So it could be if it is a test bench, it is the test bench and analytical models that are combined, but it could be also test bench models combined with OEMs device under test.

So we are also looking into that. Yeah. So we are yeah, as also as you mentioned, this is extremely IP secured way and we are trying to solve this problem. In terms of time constant, like How much time can we reduce? Cannot give an exact number, but this will improve the collaboration between the partners.

As an example, this is apart from hybrid testing to prepare for a test. This can take several months. So how does how the people test is they design a component in a digital world. And then they create some load sequences and they contact contact to the test operators. They say they want to test this test sequences in their test bench.

So there are so many back and forth, even for the planning of this large tests. So what we are trying to do with these digital tools is to give our customers and also the test bench operators a platform where they can. Plug in their models and then execute these test scenarios beforehand before the test execution so that they can save time.

in both planning and they can also reduce time in the test campaigns that wouldn’t make sense.

Joel Saxum: Ecem, when we talked off air, we talked about a little bit about this, right? This kind of, this concept of the functional mock up interface and the function, yeah, and the functional mock up unit where it’s basically like you guys took the concept from the automotive world, from their advanced testing processes, right?

Elif Ecem Bas: The FMI standard was developed Yeah. Yeah. By an automate by automated industry. So this was and this standard is out there for several years, and it is quite mature in that industry. And what we are trying to do in the wind industry or also in the testing, we are trying to adapt This technology to our models in our system as well.

Joel Saxum: Yeah. The cool thing about that was you said basically, because it is a standard that’s been used for it, this is the black box stuff, right? This is how an OEM can protect it, protect their IP come to you guys. It goes through the functional mockup interface, that black box there, where they.

And then everything comes into your side, you’re able to test. But the cool thing about that is, is since it is an automotive standard, it’s the practices out there. People have knowledge of it. There’s multiple. I think you said over 200 different tools are available to work through with this as well.

So there’s a lot of stuff that’s. That’s there. It’s just getting the, basically the wind industry or the, that industrial testing that you guys do up to speed with the, what the rest of the world is doing and, or not the rest of the world, but different industries are doing.

Elif Ecem Bas: Exactly. There are many commercial and also open source tools that are available to use this Functional lockup interface standard.

Allen Hall: Can I walk through a test case? And I want to get a jams input on this because we see the, see this a lot. And Joel and I have been around a lot of wind turbines over the last couple of months. And as Joel has pointed out, pitch bearings is the main problem. You see a lot of cranes replacing pitch bearings.

Okay. So the question we get asked all the time is, Hey, the OEM has offered us an upgrade to these pitch bearings to prevent this problem. I want you to describe the problem and say it’s a problem. In the meantime, I have other pitch bearing manufacturers saying they have a replacement that doesn’t require the fix.

Now, both of those may be right, both of them may be wrong, but I think what’s happening now is that the operators are thinking about doing testing on their own. And if they do that, the, your hybrid digital twin approach makes a lot of sense for them because it’s going to, it takes the OEM and the other manufacturers of these devices out of the picture and lets them focus on what’s really happening.

Now How would they I’m thinking of a couple large OEMs in the United States and in Europe that have this problem, how would they connect with you to do that testing? Would they just say, Hey, Ajam, this is the turbine we have, this is the bearing we have. We need you to look at this fix or solution and just let you go with it.

Or how does that interaction work?

Elif Ecem Bas: First of all, we define which part. So which. What component are we testing? Then we design the test setup accordingly for this test for this hybrid testing scenario. Because as I mentioned, we need to have the pitch actuator, we need to have the other actuators to apply this to that.

And then, Once we want to involve the models, we have to walk through with them how to define these black boxes. Then we define, once we define the interface, because we will tell them what to share in between the test bench and the model. So we will not help with that. So they will have We can help them to put this in a black box.

And also we tell them, okay, you need these five signals that are coming to this test bench, and you will get these five to your model. So we define these interfaces. together with them and then help them to put this in this black box, let’s say, and then help them execute this test campaign.

Joel Saxum: Allen, what you’re saying here right now in my mind starts screaming joint industry project between the asset owners. Get a bunch of them together that have the same machines and go test them themselves. Try to find a fix. It could work.

Allen Hall: R&D Test Systems is the place to test it because they test large items and they’ve been doing it for years and they have all the technical know how and the equipment to go test it.

So R&D Test Systems is the right place to do it. I think you’re right Joel, connecting operators together to work with a job to create the control system, the black box, the hybrid, is the real link. that we’re missing at the moment. And that needs to be done.

Elif Ecem Bas: Just to give a comment, we don’t have, we don’t own the test.

We are not a test bench operator. We are test bench developers. So we know a lot about developing the test systems to test these equipments. So yeah, we don’t have our own test bench facility, but we help we know that side. And we can help our customers to develop these.

Joel Saxum: Yes. All of the things that we’ve been talking about, this is your baby at R&D Test Systems.

You’ve been your PhD is in it and the hybrid testing and everything like you are the expert in it. But my, where I’m falling down a little bit is that this is not this way of testing and this methodology and these idea of digital twins and hybrid testing, this isn’t standard yet.

So this is not in the IEC standard. This isn’t. A rule that they have to, anybody has to follow right now. It’s still in that R&D phase. We you’re sitting in this chat, this should be how we do it. And I believe that this is definitely the future, but how do you feel about, like, where do you see it going?

Do you see this being adopted as mainstream? This is how we’re going to test stuff, or is it still going to be an R&D thing for a while?

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah, very good question. I think the industry needs Kind of this collaborative platform, both for hybrid testing and also digital twins, because we can see that this is Requirements because everyone wants to improve their both modeling and testing, and we for sure need to collaborate more to do you’re right for hybrid testing itself for components. Hybrid testing. There is no standards, but there is hardware in the loop testing, which is in IEC standards, which is not exactly. hybrid testing, but it is also hybrid testing. So I can see that it would also come at some point for component testing as well.

Yeah, I don’t know when, but it will come because this kind of there are so many challenges and we have solutions to these challenges. So I think it will come at some point. Yes.

Joel Saxum: Yeah. You’ve got two great partners in the University of Aarhus and force technology bringing in the issues and helping you develop those things.

But what you, I think what you are sitting on and your department, your team, what you guys are working on could be a fix for some of the large problems that our industry is seeing. You. Everybody’s complaining about OEM quality or OEM this, nah, I don’t want to bash on the OEMs, but like they’re getting components that are failing.

The answer could be, advanced better testing to develop better products before they go out into the field because now we have Platforms with 000 machines out in the world where they have a component that keeps failing on them. While that’s good for the aftermarket companies and the people selling the extra bearings.

That’s not good for the general grid and the energy transition, right? So you guys have that piece there that could be the link between making the wind turbines that are in the field more effective at staying, guaranteeing uptime. That’s what we want. That’s why you’re, that’s why we’re all here.

Allen Hall: And Joel, That’s a good segue because I think we wanted to highlight Ajam’s and R&D test systems technology and make sure everybody understood that there is an alternative out there rather than just taking the component from the manufacturer and saying, yeah, trust me there is another way to do this, which is to actually look at it from a systems perspective and that’s what Ajam is doing here.

Ajam, how do they, how do people get ahold of you and how to. How do people contact R&D Test Systems?

Elif Ecem Bas: Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn, it’s Elif Ecem Bas. You can also find us in our website, rdtestsystems.com

Allen Hall: Ecem, thank you so much for being on the podcast. I’ve learned a tremendous amount. I know Joel has.

And thank you for addressing one of the big problems of wind energy today. I’m glad you’re working on this. Thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Elif Ecem Bas: Thank you.

https://weatherguardwind.com/rd-test-systems-digital-twins-for-wind-turbine-testing/

Renewable Energy

Brian Cox, PhD

Published

5 hours ago

July 7, 2026

Alice Rush

It’s always encouraging to see the emergence of another brilliant astrophysicist into our culture — not that his message here is particularly encouraging.

Brian Cox, PhD

Renewable Energy

GE Vernova Backs LM Wind Power, KKR Buys EDF Assets

Published

15 hours ago

July 7, 2026

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

GE Vernova Backs LM Wind Power, KKR Buys EDF Assets

GE Vernova pumps $1 billion into LM Wind Power, and KKR buys EDF’s US and Canada renewables arm. Plus CIP sweeps South Korea’s offshore auction and the CME plans wind derivatives across three continents.

Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly newsletter on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard’s StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on YouTube, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary’s “Engineering with Rosie” YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!

The Uptime Wind Energy podcast, brought to you by StrikeTape. Protecting thousands of wind turbines from lightning damage worldwide. Visit striketape.com. And now, your hosts.

Allen Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy podcast. I’m your host, Allen Hall, and I’m here with Matthew Stead and Yolanda Padron. Rosemary is at GWO training this week. And we have an announcement about Wind Energy O&M Australia 2027. Matthew, you wanna give all the details?

Matthew Stead: Drum roll Um, very pleased to announce that WOMA 2027 will be at the East Pullman Hotel in Melbourne’s east, uh, not the other one, and, uh, 3rd to 5th of March.

Um, the first two days will be two days of wind O&M, uh, conferences, [00:01:00] uh, and then the Friday will be a half-day, uh, training session. More information to come.

Allen Hall: Well, she’s not here, so we can probably just announce it, that Rosemary will be giving a terrific four-hour-long seminar on blades and blade repair, so you sign up now.

Matthew, where do you go if you wanna just check out what’s happening at WOMA

Matthew Stead: 2027? Uh, well, actually, it’s woma2027.com.

Allen Hall: Uh, over at GE Vernova and LM Wind Power, there’s been a whole bunch of turmoil over the last couple of years if you haven’t been paying attention. Well, GE Vernova just injected about a billion dollars into that company.

So although LM recently has shown very little in terms of revenue, it definitely had needed some capital injection in, uh, at least according to the Danish press, the number of employees at the Danish site is about 20 to 30. So it’s really a fraction of what it once was. But [00:02:00] it does seem like GE is paying off all its existing debt and then giving it a little bit of a cash infusion to keep it rolling.

The question really is, is what is GE Vernova gonna do with that business now? Are they planning on keeping it? Are they trying to get s- to get it back to health where they can service the other, uh, OEMs that they manufacture blades for? Or is there a larger action that will happen in the near future?

What do we think?

Matthew Stead: Yeah, I’m really confused by this one. I mean, a cash injection just so that you’re not bankrupt on paper is, um, that’s just playing with money as far as I’m concerned. Or I’m not sure if it’s a US term, but, you know, shuffling deckchairs on the Titanic. It doesn’t– Does it change anything?

Allen Hall: Well, uh, th- they made no announcements about closing facilities. The LM blade facility in North Dakota still appears to be making blades. There’s the TPI factories, which are going through a transition r- right now, appear to be making GE [00:03:00] blades. I, I assume Gaspé up in Canada is still making blades, at least that’s the story.

If GE’s gonna rely upon LM to make blades, they’re gonna need to keep them open. Is, is this more of just keeping the factories open with a skeleton engineering crew and possibly moving the blade design group into the States? Is that– Or India or, or somewhere?

Yolanda Padron: And they’re still selling, right? They’re still selling blades.

It seems like they’re still planning on manufacturing blades. Do we think that maybe- They’re just trying to avoid that whole TPI bankruptcy deal to not have to kind of scrap for parts?

Allen Hall: Yeah, it’s a great question. I think TPI has been producing parts at high quantity, and some of the Things I’ve heard from the industry folk is that TPI is really busy in producing quality blades, and it’s like the bankruptcy transaction is not happening, which is great to hear because the [00:04:00]industry needs blades, and there’s a lot of repowering going on in the United States and a lot of activity in general, so they need blades.

But does LM continue to be a part of that?

Matthew Stead: Yeah, I mean, presumably the TPI, um, whole story only makes LM more important, you know, more important to have, uh, an additional manufacturer and, you know, providing, you know, options for the OEMs.

Allen Hall: It does seem like, though, the GE offshore, GE Vernova offshore is not a thing.

Although I’ve heard a couple of rumors that, yeah, GE Vernova is offering some products for offshore, it doesn’t seem like their heart is in it. I can see that happening. So are they just trying to focus on onshore business, and that’s it for the time being? Just let it play out and, uh, wait until the elections in 2028?

I know that’s gonna get me blocked on YouTube, but that, that does feel like what’s happening at the moment.

Matthew Stead: Yeah, I reckon it looks completely like that.

Yolanda Padron: I mean, it also looks like they’re [00:05:00] just kind of trying to play everything a little bit more safe, right? So they are scaling up, but not as fast as they used to, so scaling the blade sizes.

And then they’re– it seems like they’re, they’re having their FSAs cut quite a bit shorter than they used to, right? So are they maybe just trying to focus on, like, cash up front and just trying to play it safe until they can get their, their footing right again?

Allen Hall: Or is it focus on key customers? I could see GE Vernova actually doing that, that they have a history with certain operators worldwide, and they’re just gonna focus on producing and delivering for those customers.

Because you don’t see a lot of announced orders for GE turbines. Vestas is announcing things practically every week. Nordex is doing something similar. Siemens once in a while. But what you really don’t hear anything from in any quantity at [00:06:00] all at the moment is from GE Vernova. When a company needs cash badly enough, even the crown jewels go on the block.

And EDF, the French state-owned utility, has to fund the upkeep of 57 aging nuclear reactors and build six new ones, so it is selling. EDF has agreed to hand its US and Canada renewables business, EDF Power Solutions, to the private equity firm KKR. The business runs 5.6 gigawatts of renewable assets across the two countries.

Late last year, EDF’s chief executive floated selling anywhere from half to all of the unit in a deal that could be, well, it’s reported to be about $4.2 billion. That’s the latest news I’ve heard. This is a big transaction. KKR is Canadian, right? And is a massive investment firm Uh, which I, I don’t think have a lot of wind at the moment.

Uh, what is the [00:07:00] KKR play here?

Matthew Stead: I, I love this because this is, uh… So obviously I’m Australian, and Macquarie is a big Australian. So, um, Macquarie own a whole lot of wind farm, a whole lot of wind infrastructure. So I just see this as a wonderful g- you know, fight between KKR and Macquarie. And so KKR has a whole lot of, um, they o- they’ve got some, you know, stake in Australian wind farms.

They’ve got some work, you know, through Europe with wind farms. So I, I, I think this is a good thing, just a bit more global competition and a bit more global growth. And I think it’s all coming from the data centers and, you know, the future increase in growth of, um, demand.

Allen Hall: Yolanda, EDF’s wind fleet is a variety of turbines, right?

They have some GE, some Siemens. Anything else in their portfolio?

Yolanda Padron: I think they have a bit of Vestas there too, right? Is it something that we were saying? It’s– I think this is really interesting. Um, I know that there’s not– I mean, of course EDF is the latest, but there’s some [00:08:00] operators that seem to be, um, consolidating into a bit more of those just higher private equity firms, and it’s– Do we think that maybe this is the way that the US is going to lean towards?

I know we talked a lot about leaning towards funding the data centers and maybe a bit more the behind the meter things. Uh, but do we think that maybe that’s the future of the US? There’s a couple of companies that kind of just own all the major infrastructures and then- A

Allen Hall: couple Canadian companies.

Yolanda Padron: And what does it mean for, like, asset management and stuff, like, that’s really, really different from what they’re seeing in their desks in New York and stuff, and just the larger financial models versus what’s happening on the ground, and how will they connect everything?

Allen Hall: It’s a great question.

Matthew Stead: NextEra and Dominion, you know, things are only getting bigger. Scale’s, scale’s coming.

Allen Hall: Yeah. I wonder how much, uh, this transaction will have to go through regulators in the US, uh, because it scares me when you have a, a– such a [00:09:00] large foreign national company. There’s actually two involved in here, right?

So you, you have a, a French company and a Canadian company trying to transact on, in the United States on a lot of assets. Uh, it probably won’t be that quick if there’s any oversight at all. I, I’m guessing that we’ll hear noise about it. So we’re, we’ll have to keep listening to all the news sources about it and, and telling our valued listeners what’s going on.

Because there’s, uh, we know a whole bunch of people that work at EDF and like, love those people and are really concerned about what the future holds for them. I, at least it sounds like upfront that KKR is just gonna continue with operations, but I know, uh, uh, it’s a turbulent time, and if you work there, you, you hopefully things continue the way they’re, they’re supposed to because One of the things about EDF historically has been is that they’re really talented people, that they have hired well over time and that they know what they’re doing.

And every time we, Weather Guard and [00:10:00] Yolanda and I’m sure Matthew have dealt with EDF quite a bit They are on top of what they’re operating. They know how their assets work, and they know how to manage them, and so you’d hate to lose those people in a transaction like this. It would decrease the value of the assets, I would say.

Very interesting transaction.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. But, I mean, what if the counter, what if, um, this is all part of a, a growth strategy? You know, a growth strategy with wind, solar, and battery, you know, providing more power. So it might actually be an opportunity. So, you know, opportunity to do more and some more exciting work across all three disciplines.

Allen Hall: Definitely so. Uh, but it’s a little early. The ink hasn’t dried yet on the contract. So while offshore market pulls back in general, in a lot of places like the United States, another one is racing ahead. In, in South Korea’s latest offshore wind auction, one name walked away with the lion’s share, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, CIP.

The Danish fund [00:11:00] secured more than one gigawatt of the 1.8 gigawatts on offer, including the single largest project and the only floating wind winner. And the appetite was record-breaking. They had a whole bunch of developers trying to bid on this. You had about 3.7 gigawatts being bid in, more than twice of the capacity available.

So for a country that only began competitive offshore bidding in 2022, that’s a few short years ago, that market is coming of age. This is a huge announcement by CIP, right? That, uh, they have bid into the system. They’re, they’re winning, and they’re bringing Siemens Gamesa to the table, which we haven’t heard a lot of Siemens Gamesa’s turbines being selected, but this is a massive order and really gonna help secure at least some portion of, of the Siemens Gamesa business.

Matthew, you’re closer to it. In, in South Korea, are you seeing the South Korean industry being built within [00:12:00] the country, or are you seeing, uh, partnerships with surrounding countries like Japan? ‘Cause it doesn’t seem like when– and I’ve looked at some of the South Korea, uh, efforts. It does seem like they’re trying to stand up their own offshore built-in country plan.

Is, is that the goal? You think Siemens is gonna end up building a, a factory in, in South Korea for some of these projects?

Matthew Stead: Maybe a couple of things. First of all, I have to apologize. I think, uh, we were talking the other week, and I, I, I sort of implied that floating offshore wind was dead, and I think we copped a bit of flack from that.

But, uh, anyway, wrong, wrong on, uh,

Allen Hall: floating offshore is dead.

Matthew Stead: Um, but um, you know, I’ve had a fair bit of interaction with, uh, South Korean, um, you know, Philippines, Japan, obviously. I think they’re all trying to get their industries up, but I, I don’t think they’ve got the scale So, you know, I think they, they really need like the Siemens Gamesas, the Vestas’s, um, to come in and, and partner with them.

I just don’t think they’ve got the scale, you know, the, the [00:13:00] installed fleet, the industry to really promote it. And, you know, to get the economies of scale, they’re gonna have to pull in the big existing incumbents. So, you know, good on CIP for, for pulling this off.

Allen Hall: In terms of South Korea industry, I think steel is one of their strongest, uh, industries at the moment, and obviously shipbuilding.

Those are the, that go hand in hand, so to speak. There’s a lot of steel in wind turbines, and particularly in floating offshore wind turbines. It would seem ripe for South Korea to get into that marketplace.

Matthew Stead: I’m not sure the intellectual property is in steel tubes. Um, I, I guess what I’m trying to say is the intellectual property is in the turbine nacelle and the blades and, um, you know, I, you know, correct what I said that, you know, obviously the steel and the steel manufacturing in South Korea is, is pretty amazing.

Um, but yeah, they’re clarifying what I said before.

Allen Hall: So is this gonna turn into the leading floating project in the world? You know, Greenvolt’s gonna happen in the [00:14:00] UK. There’s some talk of things up in Scandinavia. But in terms of speed, will this be one of the leading candidates in t- in getting things in the water just because of the capability of South Korea to, to build at scale?

Matthew Stead: think it’s really exciting. Yeah, I, I’m, I’m gonna watch very closely.

Allen Hall: I think this is gonna be amazing. I really do.

Yolanda Padron: I was gonna say, could you imagine, like, a, a turbine and a blade where everything is just perfectly manufactured or close to perfectly manufactured? I g- I went to one farm last week, and there were…

I mean, it was in the States, and there were so many patches on new blades. I was just talking to the people in operations like, “What’s, what’s going on here?” You know? Uh, so it’s just really… I don’t know. This is exciting.

Matthew Stead: Do you think, um, they’ll build a blade factory, Yolanda? Do you think they’ll actually take on the blades?

Yolanda Padron: I don’t know. Uh, I, I mean, it’d, it’d be great for them, I think, right? It’s a new area of business that they’re diving [00:15:00] into.

Allen Hall: If they don’t have to build the building at the port, I think Siemens would be willing to erect something near the shoreline. And in Korea, there’s a lot of major industry right on the shoreline.

It would be relatively easy, I think. You know, ev- it sounds easy now because you’re not actually doing it. But in terms of, you know, building a blade factory on the coastline of United States versus doing it in South Korea, South Korea’s gonna be way easier to do that and at scale quickly. That, that one seems like a win-win.

I d- if there’s any place on the planet that could do it quick besides the UK or, you know, Denmark, someone like Netherlands, someplace like that, Germany, it’s gonna be South Korea.

Matthew Stead: Maybe that’s a bet, you know. So prove me wrong again. My money at the moment is that Nacelles blades won’t be coming from South Korea.

Allen Hall: Well, if they don’t come from South Korea, they’re gonna be on a South Korea-built ship. We’ll be bringing th- those [00:16:00] blades in country. That’s what will happen. So wind is getting its own set of financial instruments, which sounds weird, right? Wind is wind. It’s in a very legacy style industry. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange is planning to launch wind derivatives across three continents, which are contracts that are tied to the grid in Texas, the markets in the UK and Germany, and just the Victoria state in Australia.

So today, most weather hedging happens through one-off over-the-counter deals that are sort of hard to trade and thin on liquidity, so it’s not a commodity you can pass around. A standardized exchange-listed contract changes all that. A utility or a wind farm owner could lock in a hedge in about 15 minutes.

The contracts would settle against independent data that models how much power the wind should have produced in a given place, likely supplied by [00:17:00] the Finnish firm, drum roll, Vaisala. Plans are not final, but they could go live within months. So they’re hedging on the wind. Does this sound like a smart move, or w- what are some of the consequences of this?

Matthew Stead: I think it goes back to that volatility. W- when there’s volatility, people can make money. Um, you know, and a side note, that’s where, that’s where offshore wind comes in because it’s much more predictable. Um, you don’t get the same lulls with offshore wind. Yeah. So I, I, I love all these, these creative ways of, um, generating, generating demand, financial demand.

Allen Hall: It can be played though, right? I mean, that’s one of the things about wind, ’cause each turbine is its own separate little power plant that all connect to a substation, so if you have bought a hedge and the substation goes kaput for 24 hours, you could lose your shirt. It does seem kind of risky, depending on what the scale is here.

If you’re doing all of Texas or all of [00:18:00] Victoria, maybe that makes a little more sense, but yikes. That’s gonna be a rough market.

Yolanda Padron: Yeah, the market’s already open, right? Like, you can bid day ahead, um, instead of just real-time prices. But so this, this would be really interesting for owners, right? To be able to track that a lot better than just that gut feeling, which obviously I know people working in trading aren’t just going off of their gut feeling.

I know it’s a very, very intense thing. Nobody go against me, please. This is very intense, and it’s better– They do a better job than I could ever do. They do great, 10 out of 10. But this– I think this is really interesting for those of us especially who maybe aren’t super in tune with what, uh, all goes into it.

So being able to have something that helps you plan it a bit more for, you know, people like you mentioned earlier, the people that have their home batteries in Australia and are just working on the market itself and maybe [00:19:00] not– don’t have those 10, 20 years of experience of, of actually working on the market.

So this is, this is exciting.

Allen Hall: Does that explain all the weather sources and the weather companies when we go to a wind, a larger wind or solar event that there does seem to be a lot of people offering weather insights? Is that what that’s about, is they can hedge? If you have a slightly better weather model, that would give you an advantage in this kind, kind– really kind of market?

Is that the, the goal of all those weather firms?

Matthew Stead: Uh, absolutely. And, you know, we’re, we’re part of that because, um, ice, ice, um, you know, reduces power output, and ice forecasting and weather forecasting is, uh, really important in, you know, the Nordics, where you don’t want to be promising certain power and find you can’t deliver ’cause everything’s iced up.

So, you know, we, we do work with forecasting companies to improve the, [00:20:00] uh, the quality, and it does have a mer-material difference on, on the financial markets.

Allen Hall: So is that something that we can all get paid for? by these weather companies and these, uh, forecast companies if we provide insights on lightning, so to speak, and icing, uh, is that a revenue chain for at least one of us?

Matthew Stead: Absolutely.

Allen Hall: Maybe I like this more and more. I was, I was very hesitant of this exchange, thinking like, “Oh man, not a, not another highly leveraged situation with energy. That doesn’t sound smart.” But, yeah, if we can make a small fortune, Matthew, I think we should do it.

Matthew Stead: Fun fact, there was a flight from, um, yeah, from London to Australia the other week, um, and it’s a direct flight, you know, so 17 hours, and, uh, there was a change in the weather.

So there was a change in the weather, and that aircraft didn’t have enough fuel to fly to Perth anymore, so it had to land in the outback of Australia.

Allen Hall: No. Did that happen?

Matthew Stead: Yep, because there was a [00:21:00] change in the weather.

Allen Hall: Are there just, like, kangaroos lined up in a runway shape to get the airplane on the ground?

Or how do they– Is there a runway out in the outback that would accommodate a large… That’s a large airplane that’s making a London to Australia trip. Triple 7380? It

Matthew Stead: was a Dreamliner. Um, but, um, it, yeah, it landed in Kalgoorlie. So Kalgoorlie’s a mining town. Yeah, they’ve got, they’ve got big stuff in Kalgoorlie.

Allen Hall: In this quarter’s PES Wind magazine, in which there is a whole bunch of great articles, a interesting article about grease. Grease not the country, although I would love to go visit Greece. Grease the lubricant that’s in all our bearings and keeps the world moving at any one particular time. Uh, Sh-Shell was talking about doing a lot of research on grease, and when poor lubrication, uh, happens, it’s one of the leading causes of bearing failure.

And so when you see a bearing all tore up, usually the first indication is, is there’s something wrong with the grease. Uh, [00:22:00] so Sh-Shell and bearing maker SKF and the University of, uh, Twente joined forces to answer a deceptively simple question: How do you predict when grease inside a bearing will let go?

Well, their answer comes down to film thickness. The microscopic layers of grease that keeps the steel from grinding on each other is the magic variable. The work won a major tribology award and is already feeding into, uh, some of the tools that operators use to schedule relubrication before a bearing fails.

And It all comes down to lubrication. That’s the lifetime of a wind turbine. There’s so many pieces that are rotating and are heavily loaded with really complicated bearing surfaces. If you don’t have the grease right, it’s just not gonna work. And what’s happening at Shell is one of those pieces, and we’re [00:23:00] learning so much more.

And as we, uh, evolve in the technology and become smarter about the molecules we use and how we use them, uh, this is gonna have a big impact. And I know, Yolanda, you’ve been up to– Well, you’ve been to a couple of wind farms recently. Do you s- see– still see huge grease problems that I usually see when I’m on site?

Matthew Stead: Mm-hmm.

Yolanda Padron: I didn’t think that was an issue that was gonna go away anytime soon. But it’s good to know that, that there’s something being done about it that’s more revolutionary than just paying someone to clean the turbine every once in a while.

Allen Hall: And the contaminants that get into the greases are a huge problem, particularly where there’s any sort of sand, dust that climbs in.

So keeping those joints clear and those rolling surfaces clear is a major effort. And knowing when to relubricate. And, and Matthew, you guys see pitch bearings and all kinds of problems up on blades that are lubricated that have run out of their lifetime early. It does seem like the first thing you see on particularly pitch bearings [00:24:00] is grease on the side of the turbine from them.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. I think that’s– uh, there’s even a special code that the, the visual drone inspection companies have. They’ve got codes for, um, grease and so, yeah, exactly, that’s an early flag. But also dust. You know, sometimes dust from the inserts and from the bolts. Yeah. So it’s, yeah, interesting topic.

Allen Hall: Well, I, I think it’s one of the key pieces to keeping the turbines running.

And I know if you travel a lot around wind turbines, the, the grease is the thing that the technicians always talk about, and there’s so many different tools to go out and look at these things. But lubrication, we gotta get to it. And, and Shell, and SKF, and a number of others are, are working at it to make, hopefully, our lives a little bit easier.

So if you wanna go check out this article by Shell, go visit peswind.com and download a copy today. That wraps up another episode of the Uptime Wind Energy podcast. If today’s discussion sparked any questions or ideas, we’d love to hear from you. Reach out to us on [00:25:00] LinkedIn, and don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode.

So for Yolanda, and Matthew, and an absent Rosie, I’m Allen Hall, and we’ll see you here next week on the Uptime Wind Energy podcast.

GE Vernova Backs LM Wind Power, KKR Buys EDF Assets

Renewable Energy

Trump and Illegal Aliens

Published

16 hours ago

July 7, 2026

Alice Rush

As all literate Americans understand, a) illegal aliens are not eligible for welfare, and b) the vast majority of U.S. welfare dollars go to poor, uneducated white southerners who almost exclusively voted for Trump.