Show notes
This week the Uptime crew looks at Ørsted's current financial state, reviewing recent difficulties and the pathway forward. What factor have offshore cancellations played? Is the American offshore environment too difficult? Will they source Chinese turbines? Who are their competitors? And our wind farm of the week is Cedar Springs Wind Farm in Wyoming!
Register for the AMI Wind Turbine Blades Event!
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!
Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.com
Allen Hall: I just want to know when I go to Copenhagen next time are they going to be shooting me with squirt guns like they're doing in Barcelona? You're not a tourist there. You're on business. Am I? I like Copenhagen. It's quite nice. Rosemary tells me it's a good place to hang out and the restaurants are quite good.
There's Michelin restaurants all over the place.
Rosemary Barnes: I lived in Denmark for five years and I went to Copenhagen once in that time. It's It is a cool, it's a cool city. Europe's full of cool cities. It's so expensive to get from Western Denmark across to Copenhagen. You have to, yeah, it's like there's a bridge you have to pass each way that's like a hundred dollars for the just in one, one toll.
Yeah and I was, it was much easier for me to get to Hamburg or Berlin. So I usually went there when I Had a need for big city stuff. Also the I really liked seeing music events, concerts and stuff like that, and Germany is much, much better for that than Denmark.
Allen Hall: Can somebody say something nice about Denmark?
Rosemary Barnes: Denmark doesn't need anyone to say anything nice about them. Denmark has the best PR out of any country in the world. Like how Facebook whatever? And it's just, like little reels about some amazing thing in Denmark. It's just. You get bombarded with it.
Joel Saxum: Have you ever seen the Danish plug?
It's actually like the power plug. It's actually a smiley face. That's how smiley they are.
Rosemary Barnes: Everyone knows the Australian plugs are the best design though.
Joel Saxum: Are they like the English?
Rosemary Barnes: No, they're different. And they just it's just so secure, like you got angled pins that you plug it in and it is.
In, none of these, the US ones with the parallel things where it's always just like sagging out a little bit with live, live wires, just just there, it, ugh, change it. Wait. And that's why you can only have 110 volts. It's survival. Have to lower your voltage so our kids can survive it.
Allen Hall: The reason we have 110 volts is because we have the ability to mine copper.
And we had the wealth to put in a little bit extra copper everywhere else in the United States versus Europe. Europe's at 220 or whatever it is, 221 because they have less access to copper, it's more expensive.
Rosemary Barnes: So you're lazy and inefficient is what you're saying?
Allen Hall: No, we just use the resources that are available.
I'm Allen Hall and I'll be joined by the rest of the Uptime hosts after these news headlines. Brisbane based power generator Renewable Energy Partners has proposed a 5 gigawatt wind power complex in Queensland, Australia. The Bogunda wind farm is planned to be installed in phases. The initial phase is expected to be 2 gigawatts, with the capacity to generate electricity for 200, 000 homes annually.
The project will be connected to the proposed CopperString 2. 0 transmission link. Renewable Energy Partners aims to bring the initial 2 gigawatt portion online by the end of 2030. Vestas is restructuring its operations. The company will cut approximately 54 positions at its factory in Ringskobing, Denmark, while expanding production in Colorado in the USA.
This move is in response to increased demand for its V 163 onshore turbines in the American market. After adjustments, about 350 employees are expected to remain at the Ringskobing factory. Ørsted reported impairment losses of 3. 9 billion Danish crowns in the second quarter of 2024. The losses were partly due to a delay in the construction of its 704 megawatt revolution wind project off of Rhode Island and Connecticut.
The company has pushed back the start of commercial operations for this project from 2025 to 2026. Despite these challenges, Orr said beat analysts expectations with a 59 percent rise in second quarter profits before interest tax depreciation and amateurization. Orset has also stated that while it currently has no Chinese turbines in its project pipeline, it does not rule out buying turbines or technology from China in the future.
The company is monitoring developments in the European wind turbine market where Chinese manufacturers have Been gaining momentum, Snipper mentioned that the company is already using Chinese components and steel for its projects. Netsco, a U. S. based naval architecture firm, is finalizing an agreement to build and operate a Jones Act compliant feeder vessel for offshore wind turbine installations.
The new feeder barge design incorporates dynamic positioning, Anti roll motion technology and a specialized fendering system to address current operational challenges. The vessel is expected to be ready within 18 to 24 months after contract finalization. And Ibudrola, through its U. S. subsidiary Avangrid, has surpassed 9, 000 megawatts of installed wind and solar renewable capacity In the United States, this milestone enables the company to supply sustainable energy to more than 2.
3 million U. S. families. Iberdrola's portfolio includes over 75 projects in 22 states with more than 8, 000 megawatts of wind capacity and around 1, 000 megawatts of solar power. That's this week's top news stories. After the break, I'll be joined by my co host, renewable energy expert and founder of Pardalote Consulting, Rosemary Barnes.
CEO and founder of IntelStor, Phil Totaro, and the Chief Commercial Officer of Weather Guard, Joel Saxum. Mark your calendars for AMI's Winter in Blades conference happening October 2nd and 3rd in historic Boston, Massachusetts. This two day event, which is similar to the well established edition in Europe, We'll bring together the whole blade value chain to examine market outlook, innovations in blade materials, design, manufacturing, testing, and lifecycle management with a special focus on the North America market.
Gain insights from experts from Vestas, Along with scientists and engineers from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Plan your trip to Boston this fall by visiting the link in the show notes or just Google 2024 Blades Boston.
They always say when Orsted sneezes the rest of the energy world gets a cold. And right now, Orsted is coughing and wheezing pretty good. If you're looking at the financial numbers from Orsted, they booked a 3. 9 billion Danish crowns, which is about 575 million in an impairment loss in Q2. So that's a lot of money.
And part of that is the revolution wind project in the States is being delayed due to soil contamination at the onshore site, which man can Orsted not win. And then that sort of had some other cascading effects. Shares of Orsted are down somewhere around 8%. And if you look at the last four years, three, four years, it's roughly at one third of its peak in like the beginning of 2021.
Now, even with those losses, they beat expectations with a 59 percent rise in profits. Even when things are looking down, Orson has some positive news. And it looks like guys, Orsted is cutting back so they're not pushing on some of the more perimeter projects that they had, like this flagship one, the e methanol project for green fuels, that one's been slowed down, and a bunch of other Orsted related items are getting slowed.
I look at Orsted as one of the crown jewels in renewable energy, and if Orsted is having this much trouble today, What are they about to do with it? Are they really going to try to be, work closer to home, step out of America a little bit? Are they. Going to restructure. How does this look?
Particularly in light of the cancellations they had, I think it was earlier this year Joel? On the East Coast.
Joel Saxum: Yeah, earlier this year. I think that you just got to pull it in a little bit, to be honest with you. And we thought they were going to do a little bit more of that when they had the issues with the offshore wind plays in the U.
S. Was just rain it back on the difficult projects. Which you can see right now with that the power to X type stuff or the sorry, the e methanol project that they had just canceled is that's not normally from their core business. Their core businesses for a long time has been offshore wind in the North Atlantic.
They, you could, I could see them pulling back a little bit more focusing on those things, getting a little bit more healthy and then going out and trying some other projects. Like you said, you've seen this, they're, they pulled back from some of the things in the States but. Now going forward, but then you see a revolution wind come full on commissioning, pushed back to 2026.
So now they're running into some hurdles and some roadblocks around the world
Allen Hall: is because there's so much into the offshore piece and that is so expensive compared to
Joel Saxum: onshore. It's risky, right? There's just a lot more capital at play. Rosemary rec or has recommended the books how big things get done before.