Register for the SkySpecs webinar! The crew discusses the resignation of Wind Europe CEO Giles Dickson and his impact on the organization. They examine a new executive order from the White House targeting 'unreliable' wind and solar energy sources, analyzing its potential effects on tax credits and the renewable energy market.



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: Welcome to the Uptime Winner d podcast. I'm Alan Hall in the Queen City, Charlotte, North Carolina.



I got filter the tower out in California and Joel Saxon is in wet Austin, Texas. It rained again today. The storm waters have been severe, like a hundred year flood Situations in Texas have been very dangerous and a lot of people have been injured down there. yeah, our condolences go out to everybody affected down in Texas and there's supposed to be some more severe.



Rainstorms in the East coast of the United States. So hold on tight. there's a lot of news going on [00:01:00] this week around the world. the one that sticks out first and I wanna bring this to the attention of everybody that, if you haven't heard yet, is, wind Europe. CEO Giles Dixon has announced he's stepping down after 10 years as leading WIN Europe.



And I was stunned when this happened. And obviously, I. Don't have any influence in when Europe being an American. I just watch from the outside and I, from what I've seen and attended the conferences over in Europe, everything from what I've seen under his tutelage has been great. And the promotional materials and all the information that when Europe provides, has been outstanding.



so Giles is going to go back to teaching. He's gonna go back into the schoolhouse. but it, seems like it's a shock to everybody at, Wind Europe, at least that's the outward appearance. Board chair Henrik Anderson, who is the head of Vestus Praise Dixon's, tremendous contribution, noting [00:02:00] that he will leave Wind Europe stronger than he when he arrived.



And that's clearly the case. Phil, do you have any insight as to what's going on behind the scenes over in Wind Europe and with Giles? 



Phil Totaro: I do not, but I can also speak from personal experience, having met him, I wanna say back in 2018 or probably 2017. and I can certainly attest to the, the work that they've done.

Allen discusses the strain on America's largest power grid due to data center demand, Taiwan's $3 billion wind farm project, the potential sale of Allete and new data center regulations in Ohio.



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!



America's largest power grid is under serious strain. Data centers and AI chatbots are using electricity faster than new power plants can be built.



PJM Interconnection covers thirteen states from Illinois to Tennessee and Virginia to New Jersey. The company serves sixty seven million customers. This summer, electricity bills could jump more than twenty percent in some areas.



The region has the most data centers in the world. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is threatening to pull his state out of the grid entirely. Recently, PJM's CEO has announced he's leaving and PJM Board members have been voted out.



PJM spokesman Jeffrey Shields says the problem is simple economics. "Prices will remain high as long as demand growth is outstripping supply. Right now, we need every megawatt we can get."



The grid lost more than five point six gigawatts in the last decade. Old power plants shut down faster than new ones come online. Meanwhile, data center demand keeps growing. By twenty thirty, PJM expects thirty two gigawatts of increased demand. Almost all of that will come from data centers.



Ørsted has secured three billion dollars in financing for a major wind farm project in Taiwan.



The Greater Changhua Two project will supply clean energy to over one million households once it's fully operational. The wind farm sits thirty to thirty seven miles off Taiwan's coast.



Taiwan wants twenty percent of its electricity to come from renewable sources by twenty twenty five. This project is a critical step toward that goal.



Ørsted plans to sell part of its ownership stake after the project is completed. This strategy lets the company recycle money into new projects while keeping operational control.



Allete is one step closer to being sold. The Minnesota Department of Commerce has withdrawn its opposition to the six point two billion dollar deal.



Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Global Infrastructure Partners want to buy the company. Allete runs Minnesota Power and Superior Water, Light and Power of Wisconsin.



The sale still needs approval from the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission. That's the last hurdle before the deal can close.



The new owners have agreed to several customer protections. They'll freeze rates for one year and reduce the company's allowed profit margin. They've also promised fifty million dollars in additi...

Jon Zalar, founder of IWTG Consulting, discusses the challenges of wind turbine maintenance, emphasizing the rise in turbine failures and the importance of root cause analysis (RCA). Proactive maintenance, proper documentation, and expert consultation will help to mitigate issues and ensure turbine efficiency.



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 Spotlight, shining light on Wind. Energy's brightest innovators. This is the Progress Powering tomorrow.



Allen Hall 2025: Jon, welcome to the program. 



Jonathan Zalar: Thanks for having me, 



Allen Hall 2025: Jon. Let's start with the reality facing wind farmer operators today. What's the core problem when it comes to turbine failures? 



Jonathan Zalar: There's been a larger number than they probably experienced like five years ago. I think, um, you know, the volume of turbines out there and some of the bigger issues that, you know, people are seeing in the last two to three years has made owning a wind farm a little more challenging than before.



Um, you know, between blade issues, bolted joint issues, shoes, and. Overall, like o operations, right? It's been tougher to keep these turbines up and running, you know, manpower's an issue, getting people out there to go fix stuff. It's, [00:01:00] it's been tough for a lot of people I've talked to. 



Joel Saxum: Do you think this is a, a partial result of like, um, okay, so what we're, you know, on the podcast in the last few years, we've always been talking about, oh, there's all kinds of models coming out and there's this, this manufacturer can put out this many different variations and all these things, and now.



Now we're getting to the age where that family, that group of turbines that, I guess it's kind, I'm looking at it like a class, right? That class of, that, those years of turbines are now getting to the stage where they're out of warranty and they're coming into, some people are taking, you know, ISPs taking, um, maintenance of them or an owner operator taking maintenance over from the OEM.



And all of a sudden now there's these issues popping up and different things that we're, we're kind of in this. Um, like a swamp of problems with a lot of different models. So, uh, yeah, like you said, we've we're, we talked a little bit off air here about RCAs and how to fix things and looking at serial defects and stuff, but it's just like, it seems like every other week [00:02:00] someone calls Alan Ryan's like, Hey, have you heard about this thing with this model?



And it's like, man, 



Jonathan Zalar: another one.

This week we discuss the Danish government's permit extensions for two offshore wind farms, the U.S. Senate's new renewable energy bill, the Belgian government's halted wind farm tender, and the complexities of laying seabed cables for wind farms.



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 2025: Well welcome back to Uptime Wind Energy Podcast.



I have Rosemary Barnes down in Canberra Australia. Phil's in California, and evidently he lives next door to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle and I, I had no idea, Phil, like you're that close to royalty. 



Phil Totaro: I'm not. You're 



Allen Hall 2025: making that up. Joel's up in Wisconsin somewhere in the northern wilds of Wisconsin. Next to a cheese factory, and here I sit in Charlotte, North Carolina.



If we've been paying attention or if you've been paying attention to the news over the last, uh, 48 hours in America has been complete chaos as we are recording this and the US Senate has [00:01:00] passed a bill regarding renewable energy and it's back to the house. Supposedly this is all gonna get signed off by the 4th of July.



So we're recording it. Today is July 2nd. Um. So by the time you hear this, something may or may not have happened, and we're trying to keep abreast of the latest, but I think there's some other news going on around the world. And, uh, one of the stories we found interesting was the Danish Offshore, uh, agency Energy Agency has approved permit extensions for two of Denmark's oldest offshore wind farms, which marks a major milestone for.



Wind energy longevity. The middle Gruden and Newstead offshore wind farms have received permission to operate for an additional 25 years and 10 years respectively. That is massive extension. Uh, the middle Gruden facility, which is built in 2001, has about 20 turbines and about 40 megawatts of capacity, and it's owned by a community cooperative.



[00:02:00] And the Danes being on top of all these things, uh, allowed the extension after doing an engineering analysis showing that the infrastructure has more life. This is unusual. Is this just a artifact of early designs being overly conservative? And these wind farms can practically live forever? I think so. I, uh, 



Joel Saxum: I like it.



Alright. I wish that all these wind turbines are built this way because it's then you can get more longevit...

Nordex USA has reopened its wind turbine plant in Iowa, while Alliant Energy plans to add up to one gigawatt of wind generation in the state. GE Vernova's 18 megawatt turbine has been approved for testing and the UK has greenlit the 1.5 gigawatt Mona Offshore Wind Farm.



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!



Good news for Iowa's clean energy sector.



Nordex USA celebrated the reopening of its wind turbine plant in West Branch, Iowa on Tuesday. The plant now employs more than one hundred workers. They're producing the company's first U.S.-made turbines.



Manav Sharma is Nordex's North American C.E.O. He says the company is committed to Iowa for the long term.



The plant had been closed since twenty thirteen. Nordex bought the facility in twenty sixteen and spent months retrofitting it. The plant will produce parts for five-megawatt turbines. Production capacity is planned to exceed two point five gigawatts annually.



The reopening comes despite federal debates about renewable energy tax credits.



Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds noted that sixty six percent of Iowa's power comes from renewable energy. That's the highest percentage in the US.



Alliant Energy also has big plans for wind power in Iowa.



The company filed a plan with the Iowa Utilities Commission to add up to one gigwatt of wind generation.



Mayuri Farlinger is president of Alliant's Iowa energy company. She says expanding wind energy will help them deliver reliable and cost-effective power to customers.



Alliant plans to own and operate the new wind projects. The company expects the projects to create construction jobs and provide payments to landowners. They'll also generate new tax revenue for counties where the turbines are built.



The Iowa Utilities Commission is expected to make a decision in the first quarter of twenty twenty six.



Norway is testing the one of world's biggest wind turbine.



Norwegian regulator N.V.E. approved GE Vernova subsidiary Georgine Wind plans for an eighteen-megawatt turbine in the municipality of Gulen.



NVE says this is the largest wind turbine ever approved in Norway. It's also the first to be licensed inside an existing industrial area.



The turbine will have a rotor diameter of up to two hundred fifty meters. The maximum tip height will be two hundred seventy five meters.



The turbine will undergo testing for five years before switching to standard commercial operation for another twenty five years.



The United Kingdom has approved its largest Irish Sea wind far...

Jason Moody from GreenSpur discusses their innovative axial flux generator technology, which promises to reduce weight and complexity in wind turbines, offering greater efficiency and lower maintenance costs.



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!



Today we're excited to have Jason Moody, chairman of GreenSpur, joining us to discuss a generator technology that could fundamentally alter the path of wind energy. While the wind industry has been scaling up turbine sizes, we've hit a critical challenge. Generators are becoming massively heavy, complex, and expensive to maintain.



GreenSpur is taking a different approach entirely. They perfected axial flux generator technology that can dramatically reduce weight, eliminate cooling systems. And use any type of magnet from simple faite to rare earth materials. This isn't just another incremental improvement. It's a completely different way of generating power that could solve some of offshore wind's biggest headaches.



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



Jason, welcome to the program. Thank [00:01:00] you. Thanks a. Hi Joel. Well, let's start off with the elephant in the room for offshore wind turbines manufacturing. Uh, there's some fundamental challenges that are facing them as we approach sort of the 20 megawatt stage and getting further offshore. Weight becomes a big problem.



Jason Moody: Yeah, it does. For, for years they've been getting bigger and bigger, and you can see that the industry just wants to push for that next size. But with that, the generators are getting very, very heavy. So the last direct drive generator that we evaluated was in excess of 150 tons. Now, that's not a, not a small machine anymore, but what what we're trying to do is introduce a new technology.



That can hopefully address that problem and some others as well. 



Allen Hall (2): So when you put a very heavy generator on top of a tower, that increases everything underneath of it, right? 



Jason Moody: Yeah. The foundations grow exponentially. The [00:02:00]steelwork and the structure has to grow. Then the cell itself, just based on size, lot more composite parts.



Everything's bigger. 



Joel Saxum: So we're talking like here, kind of traditional offshore wind fixed bottom right. That's an issue. The foundations have to grow, uh, exponentially to get these, to hold up this weight. But when another thing that's happening globally, right? The big push for floating offshore wind.

We discuss Statkraft's withdrawal from floating wind projects in Norway, Valero's $23 million Series A funding, and the varying quality of blade repairs in the field. The Babbitt Ranch wind farm is this week's Wind Farm of the Week.



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. Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, Phil Totaro, and Rosemary Barnes. 



Allen Hall: Welcome back to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast.



I have Phil Totaro from California and Joel Saxum down in Austin, Texas. And Rosemary Barnes will join us shortly from the Southern Hemisphere. Uh, a number of news articles this week that we want to talk about Stack Craft. Let's lead off there, up in Norway. So Norwegian energy giant Stack Craft has announced it will withdraw from the upcoming floating wind tenor for the U Sierra North area as part of a broader cost cutting strategy.



Uh, the company, which is Europe's largest renewable energy operator, we're also halt new offshore wind project [00:01:00] development to focus on what CEO, uh, Bergit Ringsted AL calls near term profitable. Strategies unquote. Like solar? No. Come on, solar, wind. There we go. And batteries In fewer markets the decision follows.



Stack craft's early announcement and may stop New green Hydrogen developments signaling a strategic shift toward more immediately profitable renewable energy investments fill. Does this slow down some of the offshore wind work, particularly up in Norway, and it does seem like. Floating will be the future here, but if Stack craft's not gonna be involved and it's right in their backyard, uh, what does this say to the industry?



Phil Totaro: It doesn't send the best signal, but it's also coming in a time when, you know, as we record this, the, the Norwegians just released, uh, four new, uh, wind lease areas with potentially up to 20 different, uh, project [00:02:00] sites. So. It seems like there's a lot of enthusiasm and obviously they've got the wind resource up there to be able to do a lot of floating offshore wind.



If they can work out with their military, you know, the radar interference and all that, uh, there's no reason they shouldn't want this capacity because it's, you know, power that they can use to balance their hydro and power that they can offload to, you know, other Scandinavian countries because there's plenty of transmission already and they're, they're already.



Planning on building more. So, um, it's just whether or not they have the appetite to put the market mechanisms in place to,

Allen discusses the appointment of Pedro Azagra as the new CEO of Iberdrola, Pete Bierden as the new President of TAKKION, and Nicolaj Mensberg as the new CEO of PEAK Wind, along with the acquisition of the Northconnect Interconnector project by Flotation Energy and Vargronn.



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!



Takkion, a renewable energy services company, has appointed Pete Bierden as President.



Bierden will be based at Takkion's headquarters in Centennial, Colorado. He will work closely with CEO Jim Orr to lead the company's growth strategy.



Bierden brings more than twenty years of experience. He previously served as a submarine officer and Certified Naval Nuclear Engineer. He spent twenty years at General Electric, where he helped build the company's wind energy business from the ground up.



Most recently, Bierden was CEO of Driver Industrial Safety. He also held senior positions at Amteck and Keystone Tower Systems.



CEO Jim Orr says Bierden's leadership style and operational expertise make him an outstanding fit for the company.



Bierden says he's honored to join a team that's making a real impact on the energy transition.



Spanish energy giant Iberdrola has named Pedro Azagra as its new group CEO.



Azagra replaces Armando Martinez. He has been with Iberdrola for twenty-five years.



Azagra started as executive director of development, leading the company's international expansion. For the past three years, he served as CEO of Iberdrola's United States subsidiary.



He earned degrees in law and business administration from Icade in Madrid. He also has a master's degree from the University of Chicago.



Before joining Iberdrola, Azagra worked in the investment banking division of Morgan Stanley.



Jose Antonio Miranda will take over as CEO of Iberdrola's US operations. He previously served as CEO of Gamesa in China and the United States.



Peak Wind has appointed Nicolaj Mensberg as its new CEO, effective August first.



Mensberg succeeds current CEO and co-founder Michael Rask Andersen, who will remain as Chair of the Board of Directors.



Mensberg brings deep industry experience across the renewable energy value chain. His background aligns with Peak Wind's core services in operations and asset management.



Andersen led Peak Wind as CEO since co-founding the company in twenty seventeen. Under his leadership, the company evolved from a startup into a global market leader.



Andersen says he believes now is the right time to welcome fresh perspectives a...

Antoine Larvol, CTO of Windar Photonics, discusses how their continuous wave LiDAR technology enhances wind turbine performance through optimization and monitoring, increasing AEP and reducing loads, particularly for legacy turbines.



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 Spotlight, shining light on wind. Energy's brightest innovators. This is the Progress Powering Tomorrow.



Alright, we're here in Phoenix, a CP, clean power, uh, 2025. So I'm, uh. Sitting with Antoine Larvol from, he's a CTO from Windar. Yep. Welcome to the show. Thank you. Uh, we've been, uh, happy enough to get actually to sit inside your booth where it's nice and qui. Quiet and isn't it nice? Yeah. We got glass behind the camera here and people are walking by, walking by, walking by.



Um, so this morning, uh, we, we talked yesterday a little bit about what wind photonics does. Yep. Of course, from our, uh, some of our other friends around the world. We've heard about some, some campaigns you've done in the United States, which have been. Really successful. So yeah, congrat good. Congratulations there.



Yeah, thank you. Um, and, and as, as a lot of things in the wind industry, Windar, photonics based in Denmark. 



Antoine Larvol: Yeah. 



Joel Saxum: So you guys, uh, bring it, bring in that Danish [00:01:00]technology. We're here, of course, bringing it to the US market at a CP, the American Clean Power Show. So welcome to the States. Thank you. Um, it's a short one, but a 



Antoine Larvol: good one.



Yeah, yeah, yeah, 



Joel Saxum: exactly. So, so I want to talk a little bit about what Windar photonics and, and it is a LIDAR based sensor, correct? 



Antoine Larvol: Yes. Right. So. We do continuous wave base, uh, lidar. Yep. Uh, main product is a two beam version mm-hmm. Where you shoot, uh, at 80 meters in front of the turbine. Mm-hmm. And you basically alternate from one beam to the other.



And measure wind speed and direction upfront, the, the turbine among others. 



Joel Saxum: Right. So we're talking about, uh, if you, if you're in the wind industry, you've ever seen these lidar units that are put actually, you're the cell mounted, correct? Yes. Okay. Yeah. So, and, and, uh, we're looking more on the optimization, retrofit monitoring side of things.



Yeah, 



Antoine Larvol: exactly. So we've never been a resource assessment company. Yeah.

This episode covers the UK's Crown Estate's offshore wind investments, drone threats to wind turbines, and Nordex's 40th anniversary. It also highlights TotalEnergies winning a German offshore wind auction and Pemamek's advanced welding capabilities.



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. Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, Phil Totaro, and Rosemary Barnes. 



Allen Hall: Well, we're back with another edition of the Uptime Wind Energy podcast.



I got Rosemary Barnes in Australia, Phil Totaro in Warm and sunny California, and Joel Saxon in practically hell in temperature in Austin, Texas. I was just down in Dallas, Texas a day ago, and man, is that hot. There's just like a, a certain kind of heat, you know, you need to get indoors pretty quick. Texas heat is really bad right now.



Joel Saxum: You know, one thing I didn't know about this area out here west of Austin, like in the Hill country, it's actually really windy out here. Like there's a steady wind all the time that, and you don't hit [00:01:00] wind farms for another like three hours when you had West, like the first ones. But it's like, I lived in Houston and Texas and it was pretty dormant most of the time, but it, there's constant wind here as the temperatures change throughout the day.



All the time explains all the wind turbines. 



Rosemary Barnes: Yeah, you sound like me when I moved to Denmark and I'm like, why do I have to live in this windy place? 



Allen Hall: So we have a birthday to celebrate and no, it's not Rosie's birthday. It's Nord Deck's birthday and it's celebrating their 40th anniversary and they've been around since 1985.



And some facts about Nordex that they published really interesting. They have developed 46 different onshore turbine types. Across the two companies, which was Nordex, SE, and Acciona. And That's amazing. So in 40 years, did those two companies now merge together A couple of years ago? Uh, is they have 46 different onshore term designs from 250 kilowatts up to seven megawatt machines.



Now Rosemary, I think this kind of high, [00:02:00] and congratulations to Nordex by the way. That's quite an achievement. It does highlight the rate of pace. For wind turbines from the mid eighties up till now. One new turbine a year is a lot. 



Rosemary Barnes: Yeah. And it's not the hugest company, right.

Allen discusses US-UK tension over Chinese company Ming Yang's wind energy investment in Scotland, key offshore wind projects from HSM Offshore Energy and Great British Energy, Turkey's ambitious wind energy goals, and new leadership at the Global Wind Energy Council.



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!



There's tension between the US and UK over Chinese wind energy investment.



The US government has raised security concerns about plans by Chinese company Mingyang to build a wind turbine factory in Scotland.



Trump administration officials warned the UK about what they call national security risks. The factory would supply wind farms in the North Sea.



UK ministers are now reviewing whether to block the project. They're worried about cybersecurity and being too dependent on Chinese technology.



Security officials say Chinese wind turbines could contain electronic surveillance equipment. Mingyang is not state-owned, but critics worry the Chinese government could interfere.



Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes had said Scotland was open to the factory. But the Scottish Government is waiting for security guidance from Westminster.



A UK Government spokesperson said they would never let anything threaten national security. All energy investments face the highest security checks.



Construction has officially started on Belgium's major offshore energy project.



Workers cut the first steel this week at a factory in the Netherlands. They're building parts for the Princess Elisabeth hub. The artificial island will sit twenty-eight miles off the Belgian coast.



The project will transport at least two point one gigawatts of wind energy to the mainland. That's enough power for millions of homes.



HSM Offshore Energy is making high-voltage equipment at their Schiedam yard. Commercial director Hans Leerdam says this marks a key moment for European energy security.



The island will also connect Belgium to other European countries, including the UK. Final assembly will happen in Schiedam and Vlissingen.



Leerdam calls it one of Europe's most strategic energy projects moving from plan to reality.



The UK government has announced a massive boost for offshore wind energy.



Great British Energy is leading a one billion pound investment package. The money will fund wind turbine manufacturing, floating platforms, and port upgrades.



Three hundred million pounds comes from Great British Energy. The Crown Estate and private companies are adding another seven hundred million pounds.

Alejandro Cabrera Muñoz, CEO and founder of Green Eagle Solutions, discusses their ARSOS platform and how it helps wind farm operators manage technical complexities, market volatility, and regulatory changes by automating turbine issue responses for increased productivity and revenue.



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!



Wind Farm operators face mounting challenges from managing thousands of diverse turbines to navigating the energy markets and constant regulatory changes. This week we speak with Alejandro Cabrera Munoz, CEO, and founder of Green Eagle Solutions. Green Eagle's ARSOS platform gives control rooms immediate responses to turbine issues, which dramatically increases productivity and captures more revenue from their turbines.



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



Allen Hall: Alejandro, welcome to the show. 



Speaker 3: Thank you, Allen. Thank you for having me here today. 



Allen Hall: so Green Eagle Solutions is in a unique space of the renewable energy marketplace, and you saw a problem several years ago, particularly in the control rooms of [00:01:00] wind operators. What is that problem that you identified?



Speaker 3: Yeah, Allen, I think it, it's, It's a challenge that, most of our customers, which are generally large operators, are facing today. But it's a challenge that have been, growing, in the past years. So first of all, it's, it goes along with the penetration of renewables in the industry, right?



So we have, due to all these many years of aggregating new wind farms and solar plants, We are seeing how the complexity, the technical complexity of operating and supervising these assets is growing exponentially, right? So we now have customers with thousands of wind turbines that have, different models, different versions of, controllers, And also different healthcare issues that they have to take care of. So the technical complexity is a fair, the first [00:02:00] factor that, it's has to be tackled from a control room, And, makes, operations quite, challenging. Along with this, we have market volatility. So in the recent years especially, we are seeing how, Negative pricing and optional markets are now affecting operations in a daily, basis. Basically in every 15 minutes you dunno if you're gonna produce or not. Up until recently it was as simple as if you had wind resource, you would produce energy from wind farms. If you had solar, you produce energy from solar plants.



It's not like that anymore.

Register for the next SkySpecs Webinar! We discuss China's new 20MW floating turbine by CRRC, and Nordex's patent application for modular blade assembly. Plus HeliService USA's offshore ambulance service and the recent construction delays at Atlantic Shores and Vineyard Wind.



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: Our next SkySpecs webinar, if you missed the last one, about lightning protection and how to use SkySpecs, drone imaging and data, and the EOLOGIX-PING Lightning sensor to help yourself on the lightning side. You can actually watch that on the SkySpecs. Just go to SkySpecs and you can see that webinar.



It's free. All this stuff is free. It's all great stuff. All you need to do is register. You can get all this information. The next one is coming up on June 25th, 11:00 AM Eastern Time. And this next, webinar is gonna have Liam McGrath from RWE, who's a blade engineer there, and Tom Brady from SkySpecs, who handles all the cool drone technologies.



So if you haven't met Tom, you need to go to this webinar and find out what's going on. And Michael McQueenie from SkySpecs. It's the rule. Subject is when should you be scheduling your drone inspections and you shouldn't be doing it in the spring. That's really important. If you wanna save some money on your operational aspects, your [00:01:00] o and m budget, you need to be thinking about how to get your inspections done, when to get your inspections done, and what tools are available to you at different times a year.



So there's optimal times to get your drones inspected and there's suboptimal times. Suboptimal times is like March. Don't do it, then do it the previous fall. and so Joel will be there. I will be there. Don't miss it. It is June 25th. 11:00 AM and you can sign up in the show notes below. 



Speaker 2: You're 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: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I have Joel Saxo along and Rosemary Barnes from Australia and I've. Just been digging through all the news over the last several days.



Really disappointing news to the United States, but over [00:02:00] in China. TRRC has unveiled a 20 megawatt floating wind turbine, and it's, has a rotor diameter of 260 meters, which is not really outrageous. The CRRC press release, which is a little outrageous, let,

Australia has approved the 943 MW Valley of the Winds Wind Farm, Bermuda plans to install an offshore wind farm with 17 turbines by 2027, and Nova Scotia proposes an ambitious $10 billion offshore wind project.



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!



Australia has given the green light to a massive wind project. The Independent Planning Commission in New South Wales has approved ACEN Australia's nine hundred forty-three megawatt Valley of the Winds wind farm. The project also includes a three hundred twenty megawatt battery storage system. The project will create up to four hundred construction jobs and fifty permanent positions. The investment is approximately one point six eight billion Australian dollars.



The island nation of Bermuda is making the most of its windy weather. Officials unveiled plans for an offshore wind farm starting with seventeen turbines by twenty twenty-seven. The project aims to help Bermuda reach its twenty thirty-five goal of eighty-five percent renewable energy. The project will begin with a sixty megawatt installation near the north shore. Officials hope to scale up to one hundred twenty megawatts total.



Nigel Burgess, head of regulation at Regulatory Authority Bermuda, calls offshore wind a compelling opportunity. The project will lower exposure to fuel price shocks and create space for long-term investment. Currently, Bermuda gets one hundred percent of its power from fuel burning. The project aims to promote energy independence by reducing dependence on imported fuels. The wind farm is expected to be operational by twenty thirty.



Nova Scotia has announced an ambitious offshore wind project that could cost up to ten billion dollars. Premier Tim Houston wants to license enough offshore turbines over the next ten years to produce forty gigawatts of electricity. That's eight times more than originally planned. To put this in perspective, Nova Scotia with just over one million people requires only two point four gigawatts at peak demand. China's offshore wind turbines were producing just under forty-two gigawatts as of last year.



The project would require hundreds of wind turbines built in water about one hundred meters deep, about twenty-five kilometers offshore. Experts say the project would actually need more than four thousand offshore turbines using current fifteen megawatt turbines. The transmission line alone is estimated to cost between five billion and ten billion dollars to connect the wind farms with the rest of the country.



The premier calls it a concept to capture the imagination of Nova Scotians. He wants federal help to cover costs, saying the excess electricity could supply twenty-seven percent of Canada's total demand.

Howard Penrose from MotorDoc discusses their electrical signature monitoring for wind turbines that offers precise diagnostics, enabling cost-effective preventative maintenance and lifetime extension.



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 Spotlight, shining Light on Wind. Energy's brightest innovators. This is the Progress Powering tomorrow.



Allen Hall: Howard, welcome back to the show. Thank you. Well, we've been traveling a, a good deal and talking to a lot of operators in the United States and in Europe, and even in Australia. And, uh, your name comes up quite a bit because we talk to all the technical people in the world and we see a lot of things. And I get asked quite a bit, what is the coolest technology that I don't know about?



And I say, Howard Penrose MotorDoc. And they say, who? And I say, well, wait a minute. If you want something super powerful to learn about your turbine, that is easy to implement and has been vetted and has years of in-service testing and verification. It is MotorDock, it is [00:01:00] empower for motors, it is empath for systems and vibration and all the other things.



And now empath, CMS, which is a continuous monitoring system that you're offering that those systems are revolutionary and I don't use that word a lot in wind. It's revolutionary in wind and. Let, let me just back up a little bit because I, I want to explain what some of these problems are that we're seeing in the field and, and what your systems do.



But there's a, the, the core to what your technology is, is that you're using the air gap between the rotor and the stator and the generator to monitor what's happening inside the turbine. Very precisely. Can you just provide a little insight like how that magic happens? 



Howard Penrose: Okay. It's, it's basically, we use it as an, as a basic accelerometer.



So, um, the side to side movement of the, of the rotor inside the air gap. Um. I could get very technical and use the word [00:02:00] inverse square law, but basically in the magnetic field I've got side to side movement. Plus every defect in the powertrain, um, causes either blips or hesitations in the rotation.



Basically, the torque of the machine, which is also picked up in the air gap, and from a physics standpoint. The air gap, the magnetic field, can't tell the difference. And, um, both voltage and current see that as small ripples in the wave form, and then we just pull that data out. So, um, uh, I, I liken it exactly as vibration.



Just a different approach, 

The hosts discuss the recent $62 million funding round for Aerones, Siemens Energy's call for increased offshore wind capacity in the UK, Canada's push for offshore wind with Bill C-49, and the installation of Vestas' 7.2 MW turbine in Germany. And the Coyote Wind Farm in Texas as the Wind Farm of the Week.



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: And welcome back to the Uptown Wind Energy Podcast.



I'm here with Rosemary Barnes, Joel Saxon, and Phil Ro. Uh, crazy week. Again, I don't know how else to describe it. The, I was just telling our producer this morning that there's so much news coming out where it seemed like to be a little bit of a lull after the US House bill, but it's picked right back up again.



And one of the more exciting things that's happened is A owns closed a $62 million series B. Uh, led by Activate Capital and S two G with, uh, revenue growing at Aeros by about 300% in 2024, and they are getting a lot of requests from [00:01:00] operators in the United States and elsewhere to fix their wind turbine blades.



They have been working pretty closely with GE Renova and NextEra. Over the last, what Joel say two years, maybe a little bit longer on a number of problems. 



Joel Saxum: Yeah. A couple years they've been doing, uh, bespoke solutions for both of them. They've also been doing their, you know, standard things that they're rolling out to the rest of the market.



But I think this is a good thing. In one article that I was reading, there is like a tier one operator starting to adopt it, right? So. Everybody was kind of approaching that robotic thing, like, yeah, it looks like it's the future and, you know, but a little trepid, right? Dipping a toe in or dipping a finger into the water, trying it out.



But now it seems like, hey, we got an LEP campaign, coones, we've got this robotics problem we wanna solve, collar owns. So they're starting to get more and more adoption and, and that shows, right, 300%, uh, revenue growth in 2024. So that's, that's huge, right? To, to hit that kind of number. So now it's up to, uh, scaling up.



Uh, the only thing that can cap that number is the amount of robots that they can put outta the [00:02:00] factory over there in Riga. 



Allen Hall: And we visited their facility in the United States about a year ago....

Allen Hall covers the appointment of Catrin Jung as Vattenfall's new head of wind division, the Netherlands reaching 20% renewable energy in 2024, Quebec's $1.1 billion funding for a major wind project, and France commissioning its first floating wind farm.



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!



Good news from the offshore wind industry today. Vattenfall has named a new leader for its wind business division. Catrin Jung will take over as Head of Business Area Wind starting July first. Jung currently leads the company's offshore wind operations. She replaces Helene Bistrom, who is leaving the company. Jung joined Vattenfall in two thousand two. She has managed some of the company's largest investments in recent years. The wind division handles both offshore and onshore wind projects. It also manages large solar and battery projects. Jung says staying focused on fossil freedom is more important than ever in these uncertain times.



The Netherlands reached a major renewable energy milestone last year. Renewable energy made up nearly twenty percent of the country's total energy use in twenty twenty four. That's up from seventeen point four percent in twenty twenty three. Statistics Netherlands released the preliminary data. The increase comes mainly from new offshore wind turbines and more biodiesel use in transportation. The overall renewable energy consumption reached three hundred fifty eight petajoules. That's a fifteen percent increase from twenty twenty three. Biomass remained the largest renewable source. Wind came second, followed by solar power. Renewables were mostly used for electricity at sixty percent. Heat and cooling accounted for twenty eight percent. Transport fuels made up twelve percent. The share of renewables has more than doubled compared to five years ago.



A major wind energy project in Quebec has secured its funding. Invenergy and a consortium of 209 municipalities and territories in Eastern Quebec announced the closing of one point one billion dollars Canadian in financing. The money will fund the PPAW 1 Wind Energy Centre. The work will create three hundred fifty jobs during construction. Construction will happen throughout twenty twenty five and twenty twentysix. Commercial operation is expected in late twenty twenty six. Once operational, the project will add three hundred fifty megawatts to the local grid.



France has achieved a renewable energy first. EDF Renewables has fully commissioned the country's first floating wind farm. The Provence Grand Large wind farm has a power capacity of twenty five megawatts. The farm features three floating wind turbines installed seventeen kilometers off the France's Mediterranean coast This is the first floating wind farm in France and across the entire Mediterranean bas...

Carlos Oliveira, CEO of Fibersail, discusses their advanced fiber optic technology for early detection of wind turbine blade damage, reducing downtime and optimizing maintenance for wind farm operators.



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



Allen Hall: Wind turbine blade failures cost the industry billions annually. Today we're talking with Fibersail, CEO, Carlos Oliveira About their innovative fiber optic technology that detects early blade damage before catastrophic failures occur. Learn how their shape sensing system is helping wind farm operators reduce downtime and optimize maintenance.



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



Carlos, welcome to the program.



Thank you for having me here. 



Allen Hall: This is gonna be a fascinating discussion. when I was over at Wind Europe, the activity around your booth was really good. a lot of interested people wanting to learn more about the technology and how to protect their blades and be able to determine early if they have blade problems.



And I think everybody on the [00:01:00] podcast knows that blades are a huge issue financially. And we just don't have enough information about how they are moving structurally or what kind of structural issues they're having. How big do you think this problem is, Carlos? 



Speaker 3: I agree with you. So we have quite a busy Wind Europe event.



we were really full all the, time. and I think that, the problem is really, getting out, right? It's every year, more than. Five, $6 billion are being spent in non-planned repairs activities. and this is impacting a lot to the bottom line of the industry. what we knew at fiber cell 3, 4, 5 years ago, that the problem was really big Honda blades.



Now it's mainstream knowledge. big companies are putting billions of euros, in, recognizing losses because of this issue. And more and more customers are coming to us. it's [00:02:00] really a big issue and we believe that, it can really put in danger the wind industry as a whole. 



Allen Hall: Yeah. And even if you buy a new turbine today, there is very little information that comes from the blades themselves.



A lot of it is coming from the SCADA system, and that's, those SCADA systems are not designed to detect this sort of. Issues that Fibersail can detect. Correct? 



Speaker 3: Yeah. And I think it's we are building bigger and bigger blades, using old technology, right?

This week we discuss Australia's recent cancellation of wind projects due to political changes and community opposition, the complexities of grid interconnects, and the need for strategic renewable energy planning.



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, Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, Phil Totaro, and Rosemary Barnes. 



Well, welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I am Allen Hall and I'm here with Rosemary Barnes, who's fresh from. Sweden, she just traveled all around the world to record this episode. Uh, Phil Totaro is out in California and Joel Saxum is up in the cold north of Wisconsin. And we, we've been just discussing off air. All the craziness has been happening in the wind industry.



And I, I have to admit, you know, I thought last week was. Insane. Well, we just, uh, put it on steroids. So not only are we canceling a lot of projects in the United States currently, we're all, we're starting to be cancel [00:01:00] them on Australia and over in Queensland. The Queensland Deputy Premier, uh, has used his ministerial powers to refuse planning approval for the moonlight range when Farm Near Rock Hampton.



Now I, and I'm sure I murdered that name Rosemary, so please forgive me, but it was gonna have 88 turbines in about 450 megawatts of capacity, enough to power about a quarter million homes in Australia and tied with, it's about 300 construction jobs and 10 permanent positions to make that wind farm go.



But there's was like a two month public consultation period that happened. And during that consultation period, about 80 per 90% of the local residents, and when I say local residents are about 150 local residents, uh, replied back and were concerned about some of the, the known people that are gonna be there because it's gonna like double the population, right.



And 300 construction workers in a, an area of 140 people, 150 people. Uh, and based on [00:02:00] that boom, perhaps the, the project was canceled. What is happening in Queensland that we need to understand that projects just kinda get wiped away like that with 140 people, 150 people chiding in. 



Rosemary Barnes: So what's happened is that the Queensland government, the Queensland State Government, it was labor for quite a while and they had, uh, renewables targets and net zero targets and stuff like that.



And then, um, the government changed last year, so now there's a, a liberal government, which means conservative in Australia. They're in power and they wanted to change their planning regu...

In this episode of Uptime News, Allen covers leadership changes at Eneco, historic renewable energy deals in Poland, strong support for wind energy in Ireland, and a surge in American clean energy investment.



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: Leading off the week, there's a leadership change at a major European energy company. As Templeman is stepping down as CEO of Dutch Energy firm, Eneco on August 1st.



Templeman is leaving to become the new chief executive of lighting company, signify in September. Eneco says Kees Jan Rameau will serve as interim CEO starting July 4th. The company's board has already started searching for a permanent replacement. Templeman joined an Eneco as CEO in July of 2020.



The supervisory board chair Mel Kroon says Templeman led the successful launch of the company's one planet plan before Eneco. Templeman held senior positions at Shell across [00:01:00] Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Over in Poland, energy companies have closed one of the largest renewable energy deals in European history. Norwegian firm, Equinor, and Polish company, Polenergia, have secured 6 billion euros in financing for two offshore wind projects. That's about $6.8 billion. The companies say it's the largest project finance deal in Poland's energy history.



The Baltic two and Baltic three Wind Farms will feature 100 turbines with a combined capacity of 1.4 gigawatts. Polenergia, CEO Adam Purwin says they have secured financing from around 30 institutions. He says The company's obtained exceptionally favorable terms despite challenging market conditions, construction has already begun.



Onshore marine operations will start next year. The wind farms should begin full commercial operation in 2028, and they'll provide power to more than 2 million [00:02:00] Polish households.



And Irish citizens are showing strong support for wind energy development. A new national survey by Wind Energy Ireland found 80% of the public supports wind energy development, 62% back having a wind farm in the local area. The survey found people support wind energy because it offers more affordable electricity and reduces carbon emissions.



Energy independence was also a key motivator. CEO. Noel Cunniffe says, Irish people know wind power is the leading solution to rising energy costs and climate change. He says, wind power is already helping reduce electricity prices and create jobs.



75% of those surveys support offshore wind energy. 82% recognize its role in securing Ireland's energy supply.