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The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

By: Allen Hall Rosemary Barnes Joel Saxum & Phil Totaro
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 Uptime is a renewable energy podcast focused on wind energy and energy storage technologies. Experts Allen Hall, Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxum and Phil Totaro break down the latest research, tech, and policy.Copyright 2024, Weather Guard Lightning Tech Biological Sciences Earth Sciences Science
Episodes
  • PowerCurve’s Innovative Performance Analysis

    PowerCurve’s Innovative Performance Analysis
    Sep 4 2025
    Nicholas Gaudern, CTO of Denmark-based Power Curve, discusses how advanced blade scanning, aerodynamic upgrades, and the AeroVista tool are transforming wind turbine performance analysis. PowerCurve helps operators use real data to maximize AEP and make smarter decisions about blade maintenance and upgrades. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Allen Hall: Nicholas, welcome back to the podcast. Hi. Thanks Allen. Good to see you again. There's a lot going on in wind right now. Obviously the elections that happy the United States are changing the way that a lot of US based operators are thinking about their turbines and, and particularly their blades. I've noticed over the last, even just couple of weeks that. Operators and the engineers are paying more attention to what they're actually getting on site. Nicholas Gaudern: Yes. Allen Hall: Instead of, uh, the sort of the full service agreement where, hey, they're under warranty for two years, I don't really need to do anything for a little while approach. That's changing into, I want to know what arrives on site, what am I getting and what problems are there with these particular blades that I may not know about because they're new to me. Even though these blades, there may be thousands of these blades out in service. Mm-hmm. Me, my company doesn't know. Yep. How they operate. How they perform, particularly at this, this new site, I'm Repowering or, [00:01:00] or building new. That is a complete shift. From where it was a year ago, two years ago, five years ago. Yeah. And I think the biggest performance piece that people are looking at is aerodynamics, and I'm trying to understand how these blades perform, how they move. Yes. What kind of loads there are, what kind I expect over the next year or two. And I think they're just becoming now aware of maybe I need to have a game plan. Nicholas Gaudern: Mm-hmm. Allen Hall: And I, and that's where power curve comes in, is like in the sense of have a king plan. Understand what these plates are all about. Yeah, yeah. And try to characterize 'em early rather than later. Nicholas Gaudern: Yeah, exactly. I think there's been an increased focus on, on data and for operators, as you say, to understand more what they're getting and not necessarily relying on just what they're told. So, uh, I think a nice case study of that is last year we were helping a customer to build a, a digital twin. Uh, of one of their turbine models that they, that they purchased. So what that involved [00:02:00] is, uh, going to site, doing a laser scan of a blade, understanding geometry, helping them to build up some aerodynamic and structural models of that blade. So then that customer was going to build an AEL model themselves of that turbine so that they could run load calculations. They could look at, uh, site specific, uh, changes that could be relevant to that turbine's configuration or how they operated it. And this isn't really something that you saw a lot of, uh, a few years ago, but I think it's great that operators, particularly when they have a larger engineering capacity, are starting to get into that game. Uh, and it's tough because it's a lot of what the OEMs do, it's their kind of specialist knowledge, but there's a lot of smart people out there. Uh, there's a lot of companies you can work with to help gather that data and build these products up. Allen Hall: The OEMs right now are. Lowering the number of engineers. Nicholas Gaudern: Mm-hmm. Allen Hall: Staff reductions. Yeah. Uh,
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    28 mins
  • Revolution Wind Cancelled, Section 232 Investigation

    Revolution Wind Cancelled, Section 232 Investigation
    Sep 2 2025
    The crew discusses the Trump administration's cancellation of Revolution Wind and US Wind, despite billions already invested. They analyze the Commerce Department's Section 232 national security investigation into wind energy and new tariffs on steel and aluminum. State governors are responding differently to federal pressure, with Connecticut negotiating while Maryland pushes back against the coordinated assault on offshore wind projects. 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! You are listening to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast brought to you by build turbines.com. Learn, train, and be a part of the Clean Energy Revolution. Visit build turbines.com today. Now, here's your hosts. Alan Hall, Joel Saxon, Phil Totaro, and Rosemary Barnes. Allen Hall: Well, welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. Rosemary Barnes is in Australia. Joel Saxo is in the great north of America of land we call Wisconsin. And Phil Totaro is in lovely California, and as we've been talking off air before the show started. There's a lot of news this week. We are not going to get to all of it in this episode. There is no chance of that. But I wanted to start off first with what's happening off the coast of Connecticut with Revolution Wind and Ted and the stoppage there, and also the more recent news about US Wind, which is a project off the coast of, of [00:01:00]Maryland and uh, the administration. A couple of days ago decided that, uh, they're gonna pull the permits from US Wind. And, and that has created quite a, a firestorm within the states because if you think about revolution wind, that was gonna power like 350,000 homes up in Connecticut and Rhode Island and US Wind, which was nearly as far down the line, was also gonna power a great number of homes off the coast of Maryland. Now both of those have stopped. Uh, and as I pointed out in a recent Substack article and on and also on LinkedIn, and I think everybody has seen this, that pay attention to what the governors had done. 'cause this is the same thing that happened to Empire Wind and Ecuador a couple of months ago. Where, uh, empire Wind got shut down. The governor of New York went to the administration and said, Hey, what's, what gives they negotiated an out, which is that New York was gonna allow more gas capacity and gas lines [00:02:00] into the state. That same thing is, I think is happening in Connecticut and the governor of Connecticut is, uh, has vowed to work with the administration to. Get revolution back up and running. In fact, there was a interview today, we're recording on a Wednesday where he was on television basically saying that, that there's, uh, the art of the deal still exists. You can't cancel a deal after the art of the deal has been signed. Which that's a good point. Right. Uh. Connecticut is trying to negotiate this, and they have been talking to the state of New York, Maryland has taken a different approach and Maryland's governors, Westmore is saying, quote, canceling a project set to bring in $1 billion in investment, create thousands of good paying jobs in manufacturing and generate more Maryland made electrical supply is utterly shortsighted. All right, so Maryland's taking a different approach and is, is sort of punching back hard instead of going to the negotiation table. [00:03:00] Is there more to this than what we can see outwardly? Or is there a lot more, uh, to it in terms of what the administration is trying to do? Or is this all about expanding the role of gas in Democrat LED states? I Joel Saxum: think you're on it there, Alan.
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    31 mins
  • Trump Helps China Dominate Wind

    Trump Helps China Dominate Wind
    Sep 1 2025
    The Trump Administration begins a Section 232 investigation to block foreign-owned wind in the US. Meanwhile, China continues to pull ahead. 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! Welcome to Uptime News. Flash Industry News Lightning fast. Your host, Allen Hall, shares the renewable industry news you may have missed. Allen Hall 2025: You know what's happening to offshore wind in America? Ørsted stock down 87%. Revolution wind halted at 80% completion, $679 million in funding canceled across trial projects. But here's what the industry press isn't telling you. On August 13th, while everyone was watching Ørsted Stock collapsed, the Commerce Department quietly launched something else. A Section 2 32, national Security Investigation of Wind Turbine Imports Section 2 32. The same Trade law President Trump used to slap tariffs on steel and aluminum in his first term. The investigation list, 12 criteria for protecting America's wind turbine supply. [00:01:00] Domestic production capacity in port, concentration risks, foreign government subsidies, supply chain security, reading those criteria. You think Washington finally gets it? You think they're building a fortress around American wind manufacturing. But the opposite is true. Chinese wind turbine manufacturers now hold the top four global spots. Goldwind Envision Min Yang Windy, they control 60% of the global market prices 20% lower than Western competitors. Yet in America, these Chinese turbines have virtually zero market share zero. The Section 2 32 investigation isn't aimed. At China, it's aimed at Europe. Siemens ESA dominates US offshore wind Vestas leads onshore in the quote unquote foreign threat. The Commerce Department is investigating it's Danish and German companies building American wind farms. Meanwhile, 7,000 miles away. China [00:02:00] installed 86 gigawatts of wind in 2024 more than the entire US has built in the last decade combined. Germany just canceled their Skara project's. Chinese turbine order after national security warnings. But those same ING Yang turbines, they're spinning right now off the coast of Italy, the only Chinese offshore wind farm in all of Europe. Irony runs deeper while Trump halts European built wind farms citing national security China. Races they had with their everything everywhere, all at once. Energy strategy, building new before discarding the old, as president Xi puts it, China's new energy law prioritizes renewable development while keeping coal as a backup. America's new policy, discard the new, go back to the old. European manufacturers are hemorrhaging money. Siemens GAA posted massive losses. Investors practicing quote unquote commercial [00:03:00] discipline. Industry. Speak for, we can't compete with Chinese prices Today. Orid faces a $9.4 billion rights issue, half funded by Danish taxpayers . But here's what makes this story remarkable. The section 2 32 investigation could actually help Chinese manufacturers. If tariffs hit European turbines, Chinese companies already 20% cheaper, become the only viable alternative, except Trump won't let them in the United States either. So what's the real strategy? Simple. It's kill offshore wind entirely. Make it so expensive, so uncertain that investors flee. The national Security investigation isn't about protecting American wind manufacturing. It's about protecting American fossil fuels. Transportation, secretary Duffy called Wind Projects Fantasy while redirecting funds to real infrastructure translation ports for oil and gas, not [00:04:00] wind turbines.
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    2 mins
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