Power plant products | New team for offshore wind fleet servicing
RWE is to establish an initial 30–strong dedicated fleet servicing team for the UK and Germany to support its growing international offshore wind fleet. Initially focused on five operational projects off the UK and German coasts, the team will have the potential to grow further in line with the company’s ambition to triple its global offshore wind capacity from 3.3 GW today to 10 GW by 2030.
To deliver the new service, RWE has signed a three year agreement with Global Wind Services to provide a team of expert team leads and technicians, both in the UK and Germany. The Fleet Services team will work collaboratively with RWE existing operations and maintenance teams to ensure turbine services are carried out efficiently and to the highest standard. RWE has also signed an 18 month contract with Rem Offshore/Rem Purus to provide the service operation vessel ‘Rem Wind’ to support RWE offshore wind servicing.
The services team will operate 24/7 and remain on board the service operation vessel for 14 days at a time. As a result, RWE can provide up to 500 services each year, to promote the efficient operation, maintenance, and repair of wind turbines.
Thomas Michel, COO RWE Offshore Wind, said: “These two contracts with Global Wind Service to provide the technicians, and Rem Offshore to provide the expertise and team of the Rem Wind vessel, are essential to delivering our Fleet Servicing concept. It will create a step change in our RWE Offshore servicing strategy by moving from site scale planning and execution to a ‘Fleet Wide Servicing’ model. There are numerous additional benefits, including delivering improved Quality Health Safety Environment performance, commercial availability and wind farm integrity.” RWE has 19 offshore wind farms in operation in five European countries and is constructing
the 1.4 GW Sofia offshore wind project in the North Sea off the UK’s east coast. Including the acquisition of the three Norfolk offshore wind projects from Vattenfall, RWE is developing nine offshore wind projects in the UK, representing a combined installed capacity of around 9.8 GW, and is developing the Nordseecluster, which consists of four sites with a total capacity of 1.6 GW.
Streamlining wind farm maintenance
Nearthlab, a well-known provider of autonomous drone solutions, and PowerCurve, a specialist in annual energy production loss analysis, have signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at optimising wind farm operations and maintenance, and maximising wind turbine output.
Under the agreement, Nearthlab’s cloud- based analytics platform, Zoomable, will integrate aerodynamic performance calculation capabilities from PowerCurve’s flagship AEP
(annual energy production) analysis tool, AeroVista, into its framework. The integration will enable site managers to understand the AEP loss attributed to each blade surface defect, such as leading-edge erosion identified through Zoomable.
Surface degradation on the leading edge often leads to significant power output reductions. With AeroVista integrated into Zoomable, site managers will be able to determine the impact of each defect on turbine
performance, facilitating targeted maintenance and resource allocation.
“Spotting defects is one thing; understanding their financial impact is another,” commented Jay Choi, co-founder and CEO of Nearthlab. “[This collaboraton] marks a significant step towards fostering an environment where wind farms can operate at their best.” Niels Bruhn Brønnum, CEO of PowerCurve, said: “Driven by the shared commitment … our partnership will redefine how the wind industry approaches O&M.”
‘Breakthrough’ for energy storage launched
A new energy storage technology, described by its maker as ‘cutting-edge’, has been developed by green energy company Superdielectrics Group. The technology stems from an ongoing collaboration with leading researchers at the University of Bristol, UK, who identified and validated the key mechanisms involved. Superdielectrics’ energy storage technology combines electric field physics and conventional chemical storage chemistry to create a new
aqueous polymer-based energy storage technology.
The company formally launching ‘Faraday 1’ hybrid energy storage on 6 March. The technology behind it has completed over one million hours of testing to create a system that is said to have the ability to significantly outperform lead-acid batteries and has the potential, with further development, to match or perform better than existing Lithium-ion batteries. The energy storage market is currently dominated by lithium-ion and lead-acid batteries. The new and patented polymer-based technology is claimed to store rapidly fluctuating solar and wind energy more economically than conventional systems.
According to Superdielectrics the aqueous polymer-based technology produces a highly efficient store of energy that chargesover 10 times faster than lead-acid batteries with high cycle life; it is safe storage there is negligible fire risk; it is low cost using readily available abundant
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raw materials, and it is recyclable, with a recycling rate believed to touch 93%. Its maker sees a huge opportunity in the $50 bn/year lead-acid battery market for vehicle charging and grid-balancing services.
Professor David Germin, head of the Bristol Electrochemistry and Solar Team, worked with a team of Bristol engineers, examining the performance of prototype devices and unravelling the mechanisms involved in the storage and release of energy. He said: “It is a privilege to be part of the most exciting technology in the energy sector that I have seen involving our organisation. “These state-of-the-art supercapacitors have the potential of becoming a game changer in energy storage. Superdielectrics’ devices are not only highly competitive against matured technologies in terms energy and power density, but are also free of critical elements, using earth abundant materials with lower environmental impact than other energy storage technologies.”
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