Published

1 year ago

January 30, 2025

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

Why Blades Fail Early w/ Morten Handberg of WInd Power LAB

Wind Power LAB’s blade expert Morten Handberg explains a critical wind industry problem: new turbine blades are failing years too early. These massive blades – now stretching over 100 meters – are experiencing unexpected structural damage due to complex aerodynamic forces. Handberg shares Wind Power LAB’s essential strategies for detecting and preventing these costly blade failures before they shut down your turbines.

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Allen Hall: As wind turbines reach unprecedented heights and blade lengths stretch beyond 100 meters, unexpected challenges are emerging from the field. This week we welcome back Morten Handberg. The renowned Blade Whisperer from Wind Power LAB. In this eye-opening discussion, Morten reveals why modern blade designs are showing structural issues earlier than expected and what operators need to watch for to protect their turbines.

Stay tuned.

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

Allen Hall: Morten, welcome back to the show.

Morten Handberg: Thanks, Allen. It’s great to be, be back again.

Allen Hall: You are one of our most popular guests. You are the Blade Whisperer. And any time I’m at a trade show, people ask, how’s Morten doing? How’s the Blade Whisperer doing? Like, well, Morten’s great. Morten’s super busy, but Morten is great.

And they want to have you back on. So here we are. We’re back on again. And. The topic of today’s discussion is about aerodynamic stresses that happen to blades, and we’re seeing more problems with that than some of the quality issues. I think it’s a combination of quality and aerodynamic issues. What is happening in the field right now with aerodynamic loading on some of these new, longer, more flexible blades?

Morten Handberg: Well, it’s, it’s something that’s been been happening over time. So if we look 10, 15 years back, then the blades were of course shorter. The and they were a lot stiffer than they were today. They were heavily reinforced and you could say maybe they were. They were under optimized that they had a lot more load capacity and that were then what they needed.

And, and in, in process of the, in, in, as the blades have been become longer than the, then that buffer have gone away, so, because the, in order to build a logger blade, you had to reduce the the, the thickness of your laminates to avoid an overly, you know, bulky structure, but something that could harness the wind in a more efficient way So that leads to slender, thinner blades that are a lot softer.

And we can see that in the natural frequency that the, that the flap wise and edge wise frequencies, they have kind of gone down. And that’s because the blades become softer. And that also means that the way that the blade behaves with the wind direction means that the gravity loads are still a major, a major component, but Aeroelastic loading, which adds to shear and torsion loads, have become much more prominent loading conditions on the blades that we see today.

Allen Hall: That’s interesting. Yeah, obviously the blades are lighter than they ever been for the length. I remember being at DTU a year or so ago and looking at one of the first offshore wind blades that Vestas had made, and it was beautiful. back into DTU’s laboratory being examined. And that blade was so stiff and so overdesigned that it could have lasted, it had, it could last another 20 years.

It had been out in service for 20 years. It could have lasted easily another 20, maybe another 30 years because of the way it was designed, how stiff it was, how short it was. It was like a 20 meter blade. It wasn’t that big. But today when we’re talking 60, 80, 100 meters, those blades are just Dynamically different.

Is it a combination of just trying to lower the cost of the blade or just the mere fact that the weight is so high? We’re trying to transport it. What’s driving down the margins here in terms of the blade design and making them a lot more flexible?

Morten Handberg: Well, it is, it is an effective of well, by increasing the length, you also increases the power that you can harness from the blade.

You know, that so, so it is a, it is a desire to create larger turbines and one of the. Easiest ways to do that is simply by making the blade longer because you have to, it, you can do it. It’s, it’s compared to increasing the sweat barrier or optimizing. And in other ways, it is a, it is a low hanging fruit and by lowering the rate of the blades, you can also live with a lighter drive train, less steel in the tower, smaller foundation.

So all of these things play in into why that the blade is such a, so much in focus in terms of. Driving down cost overall is by reducing the the weight of the blades. And that comes as a consequence of it being more it, yeah, it has, has less design buffer and it also will have less lifetime compared to the, to the more conservative blades that we’ve seen before.

You can say that, you know, some of the two megawatt turbines, I wouldn’t be surprised if you can from a blade perspective that you can, you know elongate the lifetime to 30, 40 years, because they’re, they’re so conservatively designed compared to what we see today.

Allen Hall: Okay, so adding a kilogram to a blade has consequences all the way down to the foundation, which makes sense when you say it.

Okay, so that just adds cost and complexity to every other component in that wind turbine. So the drive then is to lighten the blades and also lengthen the blades at the same time. Now, when we do that, I, as I talk to operators around the world, they come back and say to me, okay, yeah, sure we’re using longer blades, of course it creates more power, but they’re all being qualified.

They’re all being tested, right? So we shouldn’t have anything to worry about what they’re in service. Has the test standards kept up with the rapid design changes that have been made? Not at all.

Morten Handberg: As I said before, you know, gravity loads was the predominant load on all the blades. And that was also what did.

Testing and certification standards focused on. And that’s still what it’s, what’s being, being done today. There are, you know more being done on hybrid loading, combining stepwise and edgewise, but that’s still gravity based loads. We’re not taking into account aeroelastic loads when, when, when testing and certifying, but that’s all only done in simulation.

And then we learn about what have, what’s happening in, in operation. In operation. So. So the testing and certification has not kept up with the with, with the load conditions that are, that, that, that we see on, on the modern blade.

Allen Hall: So I have a existing OEM that I like using, and I just want to go to the next generation of wind turbines, which is what is happening today.

That design of that new wind turbine may not have the same robustness as the one you are used to using, particularly if you’d let 5, 10 years go by. And so then if you’re thinking about the blade design, you’re trying to evaluate blade design, you really don’t have the data in front of you then. If they haven’t tested that for torsional loading, aero loading effects, you really don’t know what the history of that blade will be.

Just because you don’t have the data, right? You

Morten Handberg: have no idea what the, what the fatigue lifetime is from these new combined loads and, and we are seeing, you know blades, structural blade damages, blade failures happening on, on wind farms. From a variety of wind turbine types, where there is no, no, no sign of manufacturing defects, there is no lightning strike, there is no sign of transport damage or failed repair.

So, you know, it’s very difficult to prove exactly what kind of load it is without having the exact model or having other kinds of other types of data. But, you know, When leaving everything out, then you are starting to think about, is there something, some load condition going on here since we’re seeing these buckling related failures in areas where they, the blade simply shouldn’t shouldn’t have any kind of structural damage.

We’re seeing a lot on On on shell sandwich panels where we, where we see deformation the damage and related to deformation defects. And very early on, actually, you know the blades are designed for 25 years, but in a wind farm, we can see, you know, multiple blades with long transverse cracks over the, over the, the, the shell panels, and there’s nothing to suggest any kind of manufacturing issue.

otherwise that would have allowed for this defect to develop. And that’s again, one of the, one of the things that I think we need, we need to be mindful of with these new, new turbines. So how prevalent is this issue? What should I be looking for in the field? The need for inspection. We’ve been saying this for many years, also for the older blades, but it’s, Absolutely equally true.

So you need to do, at least yearly inspection, maybe in the early years, do it a bit more often, you know, and do both internal and external because whatever you see on the outside, on the outside will likely have started on the inside. So doing an internal inspection is a really really important in order to, to capture the defects in time.

And, and we need to look again, what we’re looking for is not, not different from what we did on, on the traditional blade. It, they just develop earlier and faster. So, so looking for, for structural cracks, looking for debonding, that’s typically what you would see. It just develops in the shield laminates.

I am less concerned about beam structures in the new blades than I was before. Gravity loads are pretty well understood and the spar caps and, and beam structures, they’re there to handle those kinds of loads. So they’re not really as concerned anymore. If you have manufacturing defects, you know, wrinkles in them, that’s still a problem, of course, but when we’re talking just.

Pure, you know, operation, lifetime fatigue, then it’s the shell structures that, that, that we need to have more, more in focus, which is, you know, opposite because earlier, you know, the shell was rarely something we even considered as an important part of the structure. So it was now rarely in focus because we never redesigned the defects.

They aren’t like, unless they were made to lightning strike or otherwise, but they have started to, to show the defects early on. And that’s because that’s the weak structure. That’s the weak structure from aerodynamic loads.

Allen Hall: Okay, that’s interesting. So we’re seeing more failures early on, probably within the warranty period in a lot of blades, but they’re showing up where they normally wouldn’t show up.

So if I’m an operator, I may not even be looking for this because I wouldn’t assume that the, the shells are the weak point necessarily. I would look for more internal structure issues. What I think is The general method of inspection right now is going to get to the structure. So, if you’re looking for changes in core or wrinkles on the outside of these blades in places that you would not normally normally see them, that’s your first alarm bell that maybe this is not a des necessarily a design issue as, as much as an error load issue that wasn’t evaluated during the qualification phase.

Exactly.

Morten Handberg: I mean, you would do simulations from the OEM, but, but, you know, are they, are they accurate enough compared to the wind loads that we’re seeing out there? And with the buffer gone, then, you know, you might, you might do a simulation for a certain set of certain conditional wind loads, depending on your wind class.

But is that actually then equivalent to, to the, to the low conditions we see on site? Is ice loading really considered? You know, ice loading in a gravity, from a gravity sense load, that’s not that big of an issue. They can handle that. But when you change the the inertia of the blades, then you also change the airline, the, the, the share and the torsion load.

And again, the shell structures and areas that are, that are. susceptible to that kind of loading, they might see then an overloading that you otherwise wouldn’t have.

Allen Hall: I want to ask maybe a controversial question here because I’ve been intrigued about this. When I see a lot of these longer, newer blades being installed offshore and they’re failing, it seems to happen during the construction phase when they’re not in operation.

Is that because the Turbines maybe not be pointing in the right direction. The yaw is not engaged and maybe you have two or the three blades on or something that the aero loading is then different than what it would be in operation, which is creating unique conditions that overload the basic design of the blade.

Is that the philosophy is what’s happening in offshore right now?

Morten Handberg: I mean, any kind of loading that is where the yaw where the yaw is off. So the wind is not coming directly towards the blade. is a, is a problematic situation on any account because the blades are designed for the, for the heaviest load coming, you know, from the front of blade leading edge inward.

But having loads coming in, you know, from it on the on the, on the pressure side, suction side shell or the trailing it can create load conditions or can create vibration conditions that cause the blade to go into resonance. which can lead to very rapid failures. I guess that, you know, that they can be your situations that don’t necessarily lead to a blade failure.

That’s fine. But again, we’re flying blind if we’re just allowing the turbine to get wind directions from backwind, sidewind, all of that, then we don’t really know when and if, you know, the, the, that we reach a critical situation. So I would always be concerned. And you could also say, well, the blade was yards 15 or 50 degrees off from and, but the blade didn’t break.

So obviously the turbine was designed for that. That’s not true. You could have just created an overload situation that meant that you shaved off, you know, a few years or five years of your lifetime. That doesn’t show as an immediate defect, but you, but the blade was still fatigued more than it was supposed to.

So you, you lost a lot of lifetime in that event, but it didn’t break. But that’s still an issue.

Allen Hall: Oh yeah, it definitely is. So weather forecasting during the construction phase is becoming critical then.

Morten Handberg: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s, it’s always been an issue, you know, that, you know, when the, when the rotary is locked that, you know, you need to get the turbine installed and commissioned as fast as possible.

So it can, it can start to operate as it’s, as it’s supposed to be. But with. Lower design margins problem have have increased in significance. You could say

Allen Hall: that would explain some onshore things that I’ve seen also. All right. This, this is fascinating. So we have a problem out in the field. It’s really early still.

What are some of the approaches to deal with it? Obviously inspection, probably more frequent inspection, probably during the warranty period, cause it’s going to happen earlier. But what are the, some of the things that Winpower LAB and you are recommending right now?

Morten Handberg: So we’re, we’re recommending at least yearly inspection.

And there are, you know, there are some turbines, wind farms that are receiving, inspections two times every year. Some even more often depending on what kind of conditions that they’re seeing. All of that makes a lot of sense because until we have some more data on how, on, on how these defects develop and what we’re seeing, then, you know, it, it is important to have, to have a data set because we’re, we’re dealing with a new generation of turbines where we don’t have a lot of historical data to lean on, on, on how defects would develop or, Under what circumstances.

So having more frequent inspections is something that we do recommend. And, you know, or previously we would recommend an end of warranty inspection and that would be fine, you know, that, you know, then you’re pretty much good to go, but, but today, you know, it’s, you should, if you’re, if you’re building a new wind farm today, you should do yearly inspections from day one in order to, to, to to avoid critical failures, at least.

Allen Hall: Let me ask you this question, and I’ve heard it discussed on certain wind farms, large wind farms, where in windy areas, when the blades are even on the ground. Is there a chance that those blades can get torsional loading that is unnatural or that it wouldn’t like to see and could decrease a lifetime?

Morten Handberg: It’s actually an interesting, an interesting topic. I mean, when the blades are being transported, when they’re in storage, they are still introduced to to, to wind to winds, right? So there is still an interaction with the wind. That can create its own set of vibrations. It might not be the same resonance that you would, that you would see on a, on a, on an erected turbine, but it still is a factor.

It’s really not well understood how much of an impact it has on the lifetime of the blade the storage conditions and something, you know, early on, it was just not considered. And again, that would, that would have been completely fair because the blades were stiffer. They were more robustly designed but today it might actually matter.

But I think right now we can’t really say anything with certainty, but you know, yeah, it is something to look out for. I would definitely say that, but it’s not something I can add a lot of details to, unfortunately, because it’s, it’s something we’re still, you know, trying to figure out what, what it actually means for, for, for the blade.

Allen Hall: Well, would that explain why some of the OEMs and some independent inventors are coming up with these sock designs that go over the blade for a significant portion, probably the outer third of the blade, to disrupt the airflow over the blade so it’s not creating lift and maybe not creating torsion in the blade?

I’ve seen a lot more of those. Recently is, is that the rationale for those?

Morten Handberg: It is, it is definitely a part of the rationale or something we’ve seen also during construction that they were, they were applied and that it’s typically something you would do if you, if you know, as a constructor, that a high wind system is coming in that is without within the limit that can cause edgewise via vibration.

Then you can apply one of these socks or nets or however they look. And that will, that will create a disruption of the blade. So it’s not allowed to move as freely as it, as it would, if it had just been on its own. So that is absolutely something, but yeah, it, it, yeah. I mean, they are, of course, if you can prevent the blade failure, it’s absolutely worth it.

But you have to be mindful, you know, it’s, it’s something that adds to the cost. It, it’s not, it’s not a, it’s not a trivial thing just to apply a 50 meter Saco over a blade, not at all. And what we’ve seen in, in, in Scandinavia where we have icing conditions is that ice can actually then start to build up on, on, on the net and start, you know, hammering in on the, on the blade.

And that can create some structural damages on it, on it, on its own. I would. in general argue that, you know, these damages are lesser than what you would have suffered as if you had seen resonance from edge wise vibrations. The problem is though that then instead of having, you know, a few cases of a really damaged blade, you then see a wide sweep of damages across your entire fleet suddenly because these nets pick up a lot of things and and create some some damages to the blade on their own.

So, It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s a solution to a, to a problem that, that we do recognize that we do know no, no, no one knows there. So yeah I, I would probably still apply them if it was, if I was the owner. But I would also, you know, open my eyes to that. Okay, doing this, but I’m also looking into a repair campaign afterwards anyway.

That’s just, you know, to be expected, especially if you’re in Scandinavia. And I presume some of the, you know, Canada and some of the Midwestern states, they would have similar conditions.

Allen Hall: They do. Does continuous monitoring systems play into this detection at all? Can they pick up some of these aero loading effects, the vibrational effects, in them and detect what they are and give an early warning that maybe you have a problem?

Morten Handberg: You can absolutely see if something is going on. So, so I mean, I would generally say any kind of condition monitoring is better than no condition monitoring. Obviously if we want to learn about blade, the blade behavior that we have, that, that, that, that we have within the wind farm, we want to have sophisticated detection of damages early on.

And we, if we want to get to a point where we can understand, What kind of wind conditions actually drive lifetime fatigue? Then we need to go for a more sophisticated system that monitors vibration or loads or otherwise. But right now, you know, it’s, it’s. Condition monitoring is not a given, and I think for older turbines, it’s definitely a good value proposition, but it’s really essential for the newer ones because we can, because if you have some kind of damage detection, there’s some, some kind of condition monitoring you can, you can prevent that you suffer from a complete blade failure.

Not a perfect system. There can still happen things, but your, but your risk is lower significantly. But I would, if you’re, if you’re, if you’re, if you have a larger set of turbines and you want to go into more how do you say proactive operation maintenance and understand what yeah, what, what kind of things are actually driving the damages that I’m seeing.

You need to have a really sophisticated either by vibration sensor or low load sensor that can tell you, well, I got this damage and this was how, but this, this is how the blade behaved before before, before the event or during these kind of wind conditions, my vibration signal is tripling or quadrupling.

And, and this is something that is that is driving the, my, my, my lifetime,

Allen Hall: fatigue. I want to tap into that Lifetime piece, Morten, if Blades are not properly aligned in pitch, or they have a lot of leading edge erosion where the, the air flow over a significant portion of the blade is not normal, not based on what the engineers had on their computer at the time.

Does that change error loading enough where I start to worry as blades age that the error loading is changing and that I may then induce Vibrations or loads later on in life that I maybe wouldn’t have seen in year one or two. And do I need to be monitoring for that also?

Morten Handberg: If you have leading edge erosion, then you are creating more turbulence around your blade.

So from a logical perspective, I would say, yeah, that is something that is driving load. I would assume, I would assume that if it, what the magnitude is, that’s difficult to predict again without having any kind of load condition monitoring. Then. Where, yeah, we, we, we have no way of quantifying this.

So that, and that’s also why it’s so important that we, because that it becomes more of a, a must have instead of a nice to have these kind of monitoring system. And I would say that both for lightning, but also, but especially for condition monitoring, given, given what, what, what, what, what we’re seeing in the industry today.

Allen Hall: Wow, there’s a lot happening in blade design at the minute and then out in the field. It sounds like we have to be more vigilant than ever with these new designs. So Morten, this is fascinating because I’ve learned a ton here and I’m trying to absorb it all. So I’m going to watch this episode on YouTube probably several times after we complete it just to, you know, Learn all the things you’re trying to explain to me because I’m an electrical person.

A lot of people you get out in the field also are mechanically inclined. They’re not aerodynamically inclined. They’re not blade structures people. If they want to get a deeper understanding of what’s happening and get some insights from you, how do they do that?

Morten Handberg: You can reach me at well, I would say Intim, not anytime, but you can reach me at Wind Power LAB and we’re always happy to set up a meeting or or call with people.

Owners or insurers who want to learn more about the the blade problems that they’re, they’re facing. And in wind power, we’re all about, you know, knowledge sharing and about raising the bar in the industry so that, you know, we all progressively, you know, learn what it is actually that we have to deal with for the next 25 years.

And I think if we can do that. We also, we have a chance that these newer turbines, that they are, we can, we can, we can increase the lifetime compared to what we would likely look into if we don’t. Yeah, as you say, become more vigilant in our approach to operation and maintenance.

Allen Hall: So you need to reach out to windpowerlab. com. That’s their website. A lot of great information on that website, windpowerlab. com. And you can reach out to Morten via LinkedIn. He’s available. He’s on there. Just reach out to Morten Handberg. Morten, thank you so much for being on the podcast. I really appreciate you coming back. You are our official Blade Whisperer.

Love having you on. Fantastic being here and thank you so much.

https://weatherguardwind.com/blades-fail-wind-power-lab/

Renewable Energy

Making the World an even More Disgusting Place

Published

17 hours ago

May 19, 2026

Alice Rush

I recently met an attorney who told me that is specialty is traffic. “Really!” I replied. “That sounds interesting. Could you give me an example of what you do, and for whom?”

He explained that people who get hefty citations hire him to get their cases dismissed, or have their fines greatly reduced. He summarized this as follows, “I take money away from local governments, and keep bad drivers on the road.”

Holy crap, I was thinking. Not everyone is a Mahatma Gandhi or MLK, but should anyone fashion a career out of making the world a more dangerous and degraded place than it already is?

I’ll grant that this is an extreme example. But consider that there are millions of people working in industries like fossil fuels, tobacco, sodas, and building war machines. Then we have our elected officials whose job it is destroy public education and environmental health, while others work on gerrymandering so as to keep themselves in office and dismantle our democracy.

Sure, the attorney described above has a disgusting profession, but he’s not alone.

Making the World an Even More Disgusting Place

Renewable Energy

A Nation of Idiots and Its Race to the Bottom

Published

19 hours ago

May 19, 2026

Alice Rush

The appeal to America’s most stupid people is heating up, and the meme here is a great example.

First, let’s realize that the percentage of Muslims in the U.S. is somewhere between 1.1% and 1.3%, compared to Christianity at 67%.

Then, try to image any process by which our local, state, and federal laws, conforming as they all must to the U.S. Constitution could be replaced by Sharia law, which calls for the amputation of thieves’ hands, lashing as punishment of consuming alcohol, and the stoning to death of adulteresses.

https://www.2greenenergy.com/2026/05/19/nation-of-idiots/

Renewable Energy

Conference Recap, Suzlon Targets Europe

Published

1 day ago

May 19, 2026

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

Conference Recap, Suzlon Targets Europe

Matthew Stead recaps WindEurope Madrid and Blades Europe Edinburgh. Plus Suzlon unveils its Blue Sky platform for Europe, Muehlhan consolidates six specialist firms, and Mingyang keeps hunting for a European home.

Speaker: [00:00:00] 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 2025: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I’m your host, Allen Hall, and I’m here with Matthew Stead, who is back in Australia, but not at home.

He’s up in Queensland. Or actually, not even on– in Queensland, technically. He’s on an island off the coast of Queensland. Where are you at, Matthew?

Matthew Stead: Uh, Moreton Island. It’s, uh, like a resort island off, uh, off of Brisbane, so beautiful outside.

Allen Hall 2025: Well, you need a little bit of resort time because you’ve been to two conferences, and you spent a good bit of time in Austria after that.

So you were at WindEurope in Madrid, and then following that, you went right over to Scotland for Blades Europe. So I wanna hear your thoughts. We’ll start with, uh, WindEurope and what was going on at that conference. It did sound like there was a pretty [00:01:00] good attendance, and some people that I have talked to about it really en-enjoyed being in Madrid.

It’s just

Matthew Stead: a bigger city. Um, first time I’d ever been to Madrid, and, uh, yeah, the show was amazing, actually. I was, I was a bit blown away by, uh, I think the OEMs were back out in force. You know, so like the Vestas, Siemens were, um, really– and Nordexes and so forth were really back out in force, so that was really good to see.

Um, the, some of the larger operators had really, really strong presence as well. So you could see that, you know, Iberdrola, Res, um, those sorts of companies were, um, really, you know, putting a big effort in and meeting their customers and, um, really showing, uh, the world who they were. So that was really, um, you know, really good to see.

There were so many people seriously. Um, the queues for food at lunch were, were, um, one of the major problems. Um, so, um, yeah, it was really a lot of people, so that was really exciting. Um, and I mean, for me, I was [00:02:00]trying to catch up with, with partners and friends and, yeah, it was, it was jam, jam-packed just meeting people in the industry.

Um, probably a few other things. So s- you know, SkySpecs and Aerones had a really strong, um, presence there. So, um, SkySpecs and Aerones were, were doing really well. Um, maybe one of the, um, surprises for me, and I know this has been a topic on a few other previous episodes, was there was a lot of interest in bird and bat detection.

I, I, I think there had to be, like, five companies that were, were– had really big setups, and it was a really, really big topic around cameras and so forth. So, um, that was a, a big topic. And, um, then there, there was a really, really strong, you know, supply chain, you know, from, from vessels to cables to, you know, repairs.

Allen Hall 2025: What was the ratio of offshore companies to onshore companies? I’m always curious.

Matthew Stead: You’re looking through the, the list. Um- I would, I’m only guessing it [00:03:00] was probably about 40% had an offshore focus of some kind. So it was definitely a strong offshore focus. Um, obviously, you know, a lot of onshore, offshore combined companies.

But yeah, definitely the word offshore kept on popping up a lot.

Allen Hall 2025: Because Spain is mostly onshore. Like, um, like 99% onshore, right? I think it’s a couple of small projects going offshore. Does it look like the onshore business is gonna pick up, uh, just in terms of the activity on the floor in Madrid?

Matthew Stead: Uh, yeah.

Um, I, I think, you know, like I said, you know, those big operators like the REZAs and the Iberdrolas and, and the OEMs, I, I think it’s just a given that, um, you know, things are buoyant. Um, well, they appear to be definitely very buoyant. Uh, I think we’ve heard, you know, some of the positive, um, financial news from a few of the OEMs recently.

So yeah, yeah, it seems like o- onshore is, is maturing further, further, further. And so you went straight

Allen Hall 2025: from Madrid, right, to [00:04:00] Edinburgh, Scotland. That was a change in weather, I would assume. Uh, probably about a 20 degree Celsius difference. 25 down to 15, yes. Whoa. Okay. Yeah, that’s a good bit. Uh, but the Edinburgh conference, that’s the first time that Blades Europe has been to Edinburgh.

I, at least I don’t remember them being there before. That tends to be a more technical conference than Wind Europe. Uh, the, the Blades conference is obviously focused on blades, and all the relevant experts in Europe do tend to show up there. What were some of the hot topics at Blades Europe this year?

Matthew Stead: Yeah, I think it was, um, an interesting conference. Um, I, I’d been to Blades USA, so I was able to contrast, um, Blades USA a little bit. I think probably the differences here were, yeah, there was definitely some strong, strong, uh, experts there, like you say. Um, you know, Birgit, um, our friend was, was in attendance and a few of her colleagues from Statkraft.

Um, I think, and or, uh, actually ORE Catapult, the, the [00:05:00] UK research, um, offshore renewable energy research, um, they did some great presentations. I really, um, they really shared some really good insights. So, um, ORE Catapult were talking about life extension and, um, you know, looking at the, the fatigue on blades and, uh, how they’re, how they’re going to perform and life extension.

So some great stuff from ORE Catapult there. Probably another key topic that came up was around, uh, sort of related to life extension, but also recycling. The, there was a really good session on the new IEC standard. Um, um, to, you know, full disclosure, I was actually on the panel. So I, I thought it was a great panel.

But, um, the new IEC standard for blade operations and maintenance, um, is really well a-advanced now in its development. Um, very strong risk focus, you know. So depending on the risk then drives your, your blade O&M program. [00:06:00] Um, so that was a, a great talk as well. Uh, and then maybe finally, um, something close to my heart, um, I think the, the, you know, the maturity of CMS companies.

There actually, there were five blade CMS companies there, which is probably the biggest turnout I’ve seen around blade CMS, um, ever. And so it was good to see that sort of, um, interest and growth, um, and the need for, for blade CMS. Uh, and, um, obviously the last one, lightning. So lightning always an issue.

Lots of discussions around lightning, um, you know, through Greece and a few of the, the, the Balkan go- Balkan states. On the blade recycling front, there’s a

Allen Hall 2025: company in Scotland called ReBlade that is involved in some of the recycling efforts. Did they give a presentation of, of what they’re up to at the moment?

Matthew Stead: Uh, yes, I think they did. Um, they’re talking about setting up a, a site in a, a [00:07:00] couple of sites, and I think Inverness was the, the location where they’re, where they’re setting up a site. The, um, the port is supportive, so they’re working through those, those, those challenges. You know, getting a site, getting transport and access to the blades.

Um, working out when, when the, when the blades will come to them. You know, the storage of blades. Um, the, the end, end uses for those blades. Getting all that supply chain, um, lined up was, you know, yeah, it was, that was quite thorough and quite, um, yeah, inspiring.

Allen Hall 2025: And on the CMS side, what are operators trying to monitor?

‘Cause usually have something in mind that they’re going after.

Matthew Stead: For better or for worse, there’s still some serial, um, failure modes. Um, and so the industry is looking at very particular, you know, challenges that, um, certain make and model have. Um, so root insert failures was definitely one of those, um, one of those topics.

Um, and that was actually one of the, the, the [00:08:00] roundtable discussions at, uh, Blades Europe. Some other, um, monitoring around, you know, lightning and- lightning damage and what’s happening with the LPS. That was also, uh, another big topic for, for monitoring. And then a few other sort of general, more, more general, um, you know, natural frequencies of blades and seeing if the natural frequencies are changing, indicating a change in stiffness, which relates to potential damage.

So yeah, there was– it was quite a mix of the types of, um, CMS that was discussed.

Allen Hall 2025: Has the digital twin finally died? Anybody talk about that?

Matthew Stead: There’s actually a current call-out for a new research project in Europe around digital twins. So, um, yeah, one of the larger, one of the larger operators is, is putting, pulling together a team to talk about digital twins, so-

Allen Hall 2025: I, I think this is one of the more difficult things to do, but just because you’re dealing with a variety of blades and blade factories and unique issues that pop up that are…[00:09:00]

You, you really can’t model until after they happen. And after they happen, everybody knows about them anyway. So what’s the point of the digital twin if you can’t detect things early? It, it, it is a great concept, but hard to implement.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. And why? Why would you do it? I mean, you, you’re only gonna do it if there’s a benefit, and what is the benefit?

So, but I think, uh, actually at Blades Europe, digital twins was not really a topic. And maybe one thing I forgot to say is that the, um, Wind Power Lab did a, a good, um, presentation on carbon blades as well, so.

Allen Hall 2025: The, the carbon blades are, is a very good discussion, just because the trend has been lately to scrap blades and bring new ones on site.

And the carbon can be difficult to repair, or it takes a long time to repair, and you just don’t have the manpower or woman power to go out and fix it. So the, the fastest option is to build a new blade. But it does leave a lot of blade waste, which is where the industry is not going. Uh, recyclable blades, which is [00:10:00] in process at the moment, will make that easier, but you just don’t wanna be recycling blades.

You like to be able to repair them. Composites are repairable. And it’s, it is so odd that they, they wanna continue on that pathway, but we’ll see. We’ll see. You don’t really learn the lesson until you do it.

Matthew Stead: Um, however, you know, the, the presentation on carbon blades was, um, you know, highlighted a lot of the challenges, but also highlighted some of the positives and the, you know, how they do help.

Um, and so there was a lot of support for carbon blades, but there’s a lot of unknowns and, um, and there was a lot of discussion around how do you even test if the LPS is working. Uh, it’s just impossible. So, you know, traditional methods on carbon blades, yeah, it just don’t work. So, um, but there was a lot of support that the carbon does bring benefit.

But yeah, I agree with you. There’s a lot of challenges there.

Allen Hall 2025: That’s one of the things we learned years ago back in the late ’80s, early ’90s when we, at least in, in the [00:11:00] States, started building a number of carbon fiber aircraft. And the repair situation and dealing with repairs in, in remote locations became difficult.

And you’ve learned how much training it took to keep an industry running, and you’re starting from zero for a lot of places that all he had worked on was aluminum. It, it’s a completely different world. You’re, you’re training tens of thousands of technicians around the world. You weren’t planning to go do that, and now you are.

So it just, it adds to the cost.

Matthew Stead: It also ties into the OEM, um, you know, providing, you know, details on how to repair those blades because they’re not, they’re not just a standard item, so-

Allen Hall 2025: No, you, you don’t wanna be grinding into a protrusion if you can avoid it. It- you’re just never gonna get it back into that original form because protrusions are in some part magic.

And taking a grinder to them is not gonna… It’s breaking the magic. All the magic will be leaving that protrusion when you do that. Yeah, very [00:12:00]difficult. Delamination and bond line failures in blades are difficult problems to detect early. These hidden issues can cost you millions in repairs and lost energy production.

CIC NDT are specialists to detect these critical flaws before they become expensive burdens. Their nondestructive test technology penetrates deep into blade materials to find voids and cracks traditional inspections completely miss. CIC NDT maps every critical defect, delivers actionable reports, and provides support to get your blades back in service.

So visit cicndt.com because catching blade problems early will save you millions.

Well, as we know, the wind industry has long been dominated by a handful of European and American turbine makers, uh, particularly in the, quote-unquote, “West.” Uh, but that landscape may be [00:13:00] shifting. Suzlon, the Indian turbine giant that nearly collapsed under about a $1.5 billion of debt just a few years ago, is back.

The company has unveiled a new turbine platform aimed squarely at Europe, and says it will build its first factory on the continent if it wins enough orders. Vice Chairman Girish Tanti, uh, delivered the announcement at the WindEurope conference in Madrid, where Matthew was Signaling that Suzlon believes its time has come.

And since you were there, Matthew, did you hear any news on the floor, any discussion on the show floor about Suzlon entering Europe?

Matthew Stead: Well, actually, yes. So, um, um, there was actually a good, uh, contingent of Suzlon people at, uh, Blades Europe. So, uh, they attended, uh, Wind Europe and then Blades Europe. Um, and I, you know, I was able to have a bit of discussion with them.

I think, I think, uh, they were quite optimistic about, um, [00:14:00] you know, moving back or moving into, into Europe in terms of manufacturing. Um, however, there was an element of skepticism. Am I allowed to say that? So they, uh, were, they were not completely, um, convinced that it’s gonna happen, but, uh, they were certainly excited by that.

It was definitely a, a clear possibility, but not a given.

Allen Hall 2025: Well, they have a, a new platform called the Blue Sky platform, um, which will have, I think, two turbines here, a 5 megawatt and a 6.3 megawatt, which is squarely aimed at Europe and also the United States, for that matter. And building a factory, though, doesn’t make a lot of sense if the cost driver for a factory in Europe is the European employees, which it tends to be when you hear the discussions about the cost structure, it’s about the employees.

I’m not sure why Suzlon would make blades or nacelles in Europe unless they could avoid tariffs or taxation, because India is a very [00:15:00] cost, uh, driven, uh, manufacturing facilities writing country. So why would you wanna go build another expensive factory, probably in the realm of a couple hundred million pounds, uh, if you’re gonna go do it?

It probably doesn’t make any sense to do that as well as just selling turbines into Europe. It seems like the easier path.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. And then you’ve got all the, like, the quality control challenges and, you know, you get the cultural challenges. So yeah, to be honest, I don’t qu- I don’t quite understand the logic behind that either.

Um, maybe there’s, there’s some things that we don’t know about behind the scenes in terms of tariffs and other, other incentives that we don’t know about.

Allen Hall 2025: Would you see operators taking, uh, a Suzlon presentation and maybe even writing plans for developing with Suzlon turbines in the next couple of years?

Is that a, a feeling that Europeans would, would do that, or is Vestas mainly and Siemens Gamesa so strong in Europe that it doesn’t make any sense unless [00:16:00] you’re in sort of the periphery countries of Europe?

Matthew Stead: I mean, my first exposure to a wind turbine was a Suzlon turbine in Australia, and there are many, many, many Suzlon turbines in Australia.

And they’re all, they’re all still working. They’re all still reliable. So I mean, from a reputation and reliability and, um Yeah, history point of view, I can’t see why not. I mean, you know, uh, the operators will see that, you know, they’ve proven themselves. They’re not new kids on the block. Um, and so why wouldn’t an operator think about it?

Allen Hall 2025: Well,

Matthew Stead: in

Allen Hall 2025: this quarter’s PES Wind magazine, which you can download for free at peswind.com, there is a nice article from Muelhen Wind Services, and that is a growing company. A lot going on there. Our friends at AC883 just joined Muelhen a f- few months ago, and is being part of that conglomerate. And, and we know that obviously building wind farm used to mean [00:17:00]consulting with dozens of contractors, and this is where Mue- Muelhen has really s- stepped into the breach here.

So from blade repair at one company and heavy lift cranes at another company, all that had to be managed separately. You’re calling s- different companies all the time. And watching asset managers and site supervisors do this, uh, it is a thankless job. Well, Muelhen’s trying to change that a little bit, uh, and they’re saying that that model no longer works, and I totally agree with them.

It’s insane. Uh, but so Muelhen has consolidated six specialist firms under its one brand, and covering everything from port pre-assembly to long-term operations and maintenance across Europe, the US and Canada, uh, and Asia-Pacific. Its CEO, Søren Hoffer, uh, puts it plainly, “The next phase of wind will not be won by turbine size alone.

It will be decided by the supply chain’s ability to execute.” Boy, [00:18:00]couldn’t say truer words. Uh, I’ve worked with Muelhen or my company, Weather Guard Lightning Tech, has worked with Muelhen on a couple of projects over the years, and we’ve always had, uh, great service from them, and we have talked to a number of operators that love them, that love using Muelhen.

So it’s not a surprise that they’re trying to grow and expand and make life easier for the operators.

Matthew Stead: Sounds like a brilliant move, really. I mean, you know, pulling all these sort of things together is, is a real challenge, isn’t it? I mean, coordinating all these subcontractors, um, getting to turn up at the right time, and yeah, I mean, it just sounds like a brilliant move, and I think that we need more, more, more efficient service companies to service the growing fleet.

So the more they can get organized, the better.

Allen Hall 2025: Yeah, the scale matters here, and the expertise matters. As we’ve have a couple hundred thousand turbines that are [00:19:00] operating in the, quote-unquote, “West,” it does make sense to have a larger player that has seen most of those turbines and has some experience with them.

It’s always the scary scenario when you’re working with a new company. Have they been on this turbine before? Do they know what they’re doing? Do they know- Lockout tagout. Even simple things like that come to the forefront. And the, the trouble is on some of these smaller companies that are in that business is that, uh, you just don’t get the level of service, you don’t get the level of response, you don’t have the horsepower if something were to, to go wrong on site.

They don’t have the cash to, to bring in a second crane or another crew to get this job done. It, it does become scale at some point. And, uh, for a long time in the wind industry, particularly United States, it, it has been a lot of, quote-unquote, “mom-and-pop operations,” and those are slowly getting acquired by the likes of Muehlhan.

I, I, I think this is inevitable at some point. Uh, from the asset owner’s, uh, desktop watching this go on, [00:20:00] how do you see, you know, a large operator interfacing with Muehlhan? Are they gonna do just one-stop shopping at this point? They’re, they’re not gonna have three or four different companies to work with, that they’re just gonna lock into, uh, Muehlhan?

‘Cause, uh, that’s what I see.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. I, I think, you know, from the, the WOMA Conference in, in Melbourne, we saw a bit of a, bit of a shift towards, um, outsourcing, at least in Australia Pacific region. And I mean, if, if you’re gonna outsource, um, you’re, you’re probably gonna join up with a, a Muehlhan, um, equivalent.

So, you know, that way it just takes some of the risk out of, out of it, so it, it sort of makes sense. Um, the other observation I’ve heard is that, you know, because of the seasonality of blade repairs, it’s really hard to keep hold of, um, blade techs. And so if you’re a global company, you’ve got at least some opportunity of using the ses- seasonality and keeping hold of the good techs and, um, you know, so, you know, you know, summer in, in North, North, uh, America, and then, you know, summer in [00:21:00] Australia.

So it, it, it allows these company, allows these companies to keep hold of their good people.

Allen Hall 2025: Yeah. And that, that’s always been the yearly problem, right? That you have a, a crew of a couple good crews in the summertime, and you come back the next summer and it’s a whole different group of people and yeah, that, that, that’s trouble for the industry.

Well, a- and it’s good. It’s fi- it’s finally good to see this happening, and I know, uh, we’ve talked about it internally here at Weather Guard of who to work with and who to partner with. We like working with companies that have scale, and I think we’re finally there. So it’s really interesting to see this article from Johan in PES Wind.

So if you, if you haven’t read the article, you should go visit peswind.com and take a look. There’s a lot of great content in this quarter’s issue, and y- you don’t wanna miss it. So go to peswind.com today. As wind energy professionals, staying informed is crucial, and let’s face it, difficult. That’s why the Uptime podcast recommends PES Wind magazine.

PES Wind offers [00:22:00] a diverse range of in-depth articles and expert insights that dive into the most pressing issues facing our energy future. Whether you’re an industry veteran or new to wind, PES Wind has the high-quality content you need. Don’t miss out. Visit peswind.com today. So when, when the energy prices spike like they’re happening right now, uh, the Iran war being one of the main drivers, and obviously gasoline prices have jumped quite a bit, here’s what happens.

The China’s clean energy sector goes to work, and they’re racing to make connections and make sales. As electricity prices jump up, gas prices jump up, everybody wants to try to find a cheaper way to provide energy to their countries or locales. Uh, China’s there to offer it. So it’s solar panels, batteries, EVs, and even wind turbines are, are looking for homes out of China.

Uh, for European wind professionals, [00:23:00] the most important part comes from Mingyang, right? So they were unable to get a production facility in Scotland, but they haven’t given up yet. They are still searching for a home somewhere in Europe. And as of today, I don’t think they’ve found it. They’re s- I think they’re still looking for some country to host them.

But how long is that gonna go on, Matthew? I, I think with the domination of Vestas and Siemens Gamesa in Europe and Suzlon trying to make an entry, will Mingyang and other Chinese manufacturers eventually find a home?

Matthew Stead: It’s interesting. I think, uh, if you look at the airline industry, you’ve always had premium providers, and you’ve always had low-end providers, and I think there’s always a place for all of them.

And so I re- I reckon they’ll find, I think they’ll find their place in, in the market and just, you know, it might just take a while. But they’ve got the strength, haven’t they? They’ve got the product. They’ve got the strength. So it’s just a matter [00:24:00] of time.

Allen Hall 2025: Yeah. I, I, I d- I do think eventually it will happen.

But Vestas and, and Siemens Gamesa have done a pretty good job of controlling it, and wind Europe, honestly. Wind Europe has not been a proponent of a Chinese manufacturer in Europe, so that generally will help slow down any business plans they would have But at the same time, there’s a lot of opportunities around the world that’s not necessarily in Europe, right?

South America has strong ties with China. They’re– And Chinese companies are, are starting production in China. There’s a lot th- things happening there. You’re gonna see that in Africa and other places. So it doesn’t necessarily have to happen in Europe, which is, I think Europeans and Americans think, “Well, we can’t have China in those locales.”

Fine. But it isn’t like China doesn’t have other opportunities to, to sell turbines or solar panels or batteries. There are plenty places on the planet where

Matthew Stead: people that

Allen Hall 2025: need

Matthew Stead: lower cost energy, and they’re gonna find them. Um, I did attend a, a panel [00:25:00] discussion on Türkiye, um, and the growth, and there was a lot of growth in Türkiye around onshore and offshore.

And so maybe Mingyang, that might be a, a place, um, for them to, to start, you know, on the doorstep of, of Europe. The stepping stone, so to speak. Stepping country.

Allen Hall 2025: Is there risk in that, uh, uh, if, uh, uh, Mingyang decided to put a plant in Türkiye? Is, does that come with some political aspect? Because I, I, I don’t remember.

Türkiye t-tends to play, uh, uh, k- kind of like Switzerland in, in terms of working with different, uh, political systems over time. Yeah.

Matthew Stead: I, I’ve had a bit more to do with a few, a few, um, sort of organizations in Türkiye recently and, um, you know, it’s highly professional, highly, you know, logical, and so I, I can’t see why it’d be a challenge.

So I think, yeah, that stepping stone into Europe might be a, a logical way to go. Well, maybe

Allen Hall 2025: we’ll see that in the next [00:26:00] couple of months. I don’t know. There’s gonna be a lot to happen there. There’s so much money being spent in Europe on renewables, wind, solar, battery, all the above, that there’s plenty of opportunity, and every company that has a product that’s gonna be trying to sell it in Europe right now.

It’s a smart move. Absolutely.

Matthew Stead: I think the other thing that we’ll probably be talking about a little bit more is EV trucks or, you know, electric trucks.

Allen Hall 2025: You think so?

Matthew Stead: I reckon we’ll be talking more and more about electric trucks.

Allen Hall 2025: Does Europe even have a, a le- a real true EV tractor-trailer, large truck?

What do they call… I guess they call it a lorry.

Matthew Stead: I don’t think yet. But that’s why I’m saying I think this is a topic that’s gonna raise itself. Um, I’ve, I’ve seen some numbers recently which says that it’s a bit of a no-brainer to go from diesel to, um, to battery now.

Allen Hall 2025: So is Tesla gonna be the, the winner there just because of their, I don’t even what they call it, the Tesla truck?

Is that what they call that now?

Matthew Stead: Not the Cybertruck, the, the truck truck.

Allen Hall 2025: Electric semi-truck. There you go. [00:27:00] Thank you, producer Claire.

Matthew Stead: I think you’ve gotta watch, you know, you’ve gotta watch BYD and a few of the other, the other, um, other companies.

Allen Hall 2025: Do they have something as large as what, uh, Tesla is offering today?

Because Tesla is offering a true semi or tractor-trailer

Matthew Stead: I, I, I must admit I’m not a, a huge expert on the topic, but I’m sure Rosemary is.

Allen Hall 2025: She drives the big rigs? Is that what she’s doing?

Matthew Stead: But I think we– Yeah, I think, I think it’s an in-interesting thing to watch because, um, certainly fuel prices in Australia are definitely pushing, um, this idea of, um, electric trucks.

Allen Hall 2025: Yeah, diesel prices are really high in the States. I- if they’re high in the States, I can’t even imagine what they are in Europe or Australia. They must be through the roof. So if you have a diesel vehicle, although they run forever and are pretty efficient, the price of fuel is insane right now.

Matthew Stead: And, you know, if you, if you take that a step further into mining, so Twiggy Forest, um, and Fortescue, you know, switching to [00:28:00] electric, uh, trucks and electric mining, yeah, it makes sense.

Allen Hall 2025: Does the math work out on that? Uh, obviously Fortescue is taking, uh, really a pretty significant risk in that they’re developing their own electricity generation sites via wind and solar and battery, the whole thing, and they’re converting some of their larger vehicles to electric. Does that hold a big risk, or is this just a financial no-brainer, particularly when diesel prices are so high?

Matthew Stead: Yeah, I think it’s a financial no-brainer. Uh, and that’s why partly I think we’ll be talking about trucks because, you know, once the finances make sense, um, there’ll be a faster transition. And I think, you know, Fortescue is not a silly company.

Allen Hall 2025: Fortescue is willing to dabble, right? So they’re willing to, to see where the technology is and spend a little bit of money and possibly it works out, right?

I think there’s– you have to take a little bit of risk if you’re in that business because you are spending so much money on fuel. [00:29:00] You can spend a couple million dollars playing in different areas to pick an eventual winner. Obviously, they’re gonna– Well, it’s not obvious at the moment, but it, it seems obvious to us being on the electricity side.

Electricity is gonna be the answer. Renewable energy is gonna be the easy way to do it, the lowest cost way to do it. There you go. Go do it. Well, American Clean Power’s event, uh, which is in Houston this year, will be happening June 1st through the 4th at the convention center downtown in Houston. It’s gonna be warm, everybody, so if you’re traveling from a cooler country like Denmark to Houston, bring something cool to wear.

It will be warm in June. It, it– Houston is just a very warm place, and it’s quite humid, so it’ll, it’ll be a, a unique environment. However, it does sound like there’s gonna be a, a, an– A number of interesting companies and a lot of people that are attending that event this year, and one of them is gonna be Matthew and EOLOGIX-PING with Weather Guard Lightning Tech will [00:30:00] both be down at the event in a booth and seeing everybody and, and, and meeting a whole bunch of, of, uh, new people that are getting into the industry, which is, to me, is always the fun part.

Like, we just meet so many really fun people. Uh, and Matthew, you know, we had a discussion internally about that, like, uh, our, our new, uh, chief commercial officer, Nikki Briggs, has been commenting. We’ve been talking to so many operators around the world, and after every, uh, little meeting briefing that we have, we do a post-briefing, and she goes, “They were so nice.”

And I s- yes, Nikki, the wind industry people are fantastic to work with. Like, they’re all focused on doing something positive, and they’re trying to, to do it the best that they can. And there’s a lot of constraints to it, and they’re making a number of hard decisions. But when we all come together at American Clean Power here in the States, hey, we can kinda commiserate and [00:31:00] talk about what’s happening and catch up.

And I feel like we need a little bit of catch-up time in this industry, particularly here in the United States.

Matthew Stead: Yeah. Yeah. I, I think, um, I, I definitely agree. And I, I found, you know, previously I used to work in the construction industry and work with engineers and, you know, transport, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And actually, I found that the renewable industry, there’s a lot of really open people, really happy to have a discussion, um, not the big egos, so I completely agree. And, um, I’m thinking back, um, I first met people in the wind industry in, you know, around 2012, 2013, and, you know, I still know a number of those people and really appreciate catching up with them.

Um, so actually, Berend van der Pol was probably one of the first, and, uh, Birgit Junker was, um, maybe one of the second, so yeah. And I’m definitely looking forward to ACP.

Allen Hall 2025: If you’re, if you’re down in Houston at American Clean Power, definitely stop by a- and say hi to everybody from [00:32:00]EOLOGIX-PING and Weather Guard Lightning Tech, and hey, learn about all the things that are going on because both companies have new products that’ll, were gonna be announced at the site.

Uh, we’re already getting inundated with requests on the Weather Guard side. It’s insane. We’re telling people, like, “Slow down, slow down, slow down. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll talk to you about it when we get to Houston.” But, uh, expect a very attentive audience this year, which is exciting. 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 LinkedIn, and don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode. And if you found value in today’s conversation, please leave us a review. It helps other wind energy professionals follow the show. For Matthew, I’m Allen Hall, and we’ll see you here next week on the Uptime Wind Energy [00:33:00] Podcast.