Dickens once wrote “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times” and this sentiment could summarize the 2013 Wind Power Exhibition and Conference held at Chicago’s McCormick Place in early May. The reason for the ambivalent mood comes from solid industry growth for turbines and wind farm installations, but lower natural gas prices and the precarious Production Tax Credit (PTC) looming over the industry.
For instance, the Global Wind Energy Council (www.gwec.net) reports that wind power grew by 11 percent in 2012 over 2011, and half of all new energy installed in 2012 was wind power. Strong growth. However, the Production Tax Credit (PTC) in the United States received only a one-year extension into 2013—included in the fiscal cliff deal—and the wind industry needs a long-term subsidy to compete with natural gas. (The oil and gas industry is at the beginning of a $24 billion, 10-year subsidy from the U.S. government.)
Adding more gloom to the industry, Europe is in the midst of austerity measures, and China and India had an off year for wind installations in 2012 to provide more
In the afternoon keynote conference on Monday titled, “Long-Term Vision for Wind Energy in the U.S.,” the senior vice president of the American Wind Energy Association, Rob Gramlich, looked to suppliers to make large technology investments. Gramlich said “new technology advancements are critical to improving the cost formula to energy providers. And if all energy procurement started right now with 20-yr. energy contracts, wind power would be the cheapest energy path.”
With technology advancements needed, GE Power and Water (www.ge-energy.com) brought the holy grail of renewable energy to the Chicago event: energy storage. The company announced its 2.5-120 Brillant Wind Turbines would be installed at the Invenergy (www.invenergy.com) wind farm in Mills County, Tex.
The 86-turbine deal is the first for GE’s 2.5.-120 system, which was released in January 2013, and marks a breakthrough with its energy storage capability and its ability to analyze tens of thousands data points per second. This turbine system leverages short-term battery storage, Durathon battery technology, and three software applications from GE. The predictable power software allows a turbine to “smooth out” short-term peaks and valleys in wind power and makes it predictable over periods of 15 to 60 minutes. The ramp-control software captures “wasted” wind power and then stores it in the battery, and frequency-regulation software works with the energy grid to provide energy from batteries on-demand.
Here is a roundup of other automation technology on display at the show:
Zurich, Switzerland based ABB showcased its high-voltage direct current (HVDC) breaker technology breakthrough from (insert link: http://www.automationworld.com/abb-solves-code-dc-breaker) 2012 that aims directly at off-shore wind farms with its promise to carry DC current over long distances in a much more efficient manner. Also on display was Ventyx’s (www.ventyx.com)--an ABB company--Energy Portfolio Management (EPM) solutions that focuses on siting, curtailment and uncertainty in forecasting and valuation of wind generation.
BLADEcontrol from Bosch Rexroth (www.boschrexroth-us.com) delivers piezo-electric acceleration sensors bonded to directly into rotor blades to provide up-to-date condition monitoring. Based on natural oscillation, rotor blades provide a unique “fingerprint” pattern. This system utilizes “the evaluation and communication unit (ECU) to assess the current state of the rotor blades by comparing the actual spectra with the stored spectra gleaned from a variety of commonly-recognized disturbance conditions.” Conditions can be monitored via any web browser, no special software needed.
Industrial control supplier, Red Lion Controls (www.redlion.net), displayed its single-ring wind farm network architecture at the show, featuring the modular NT 24K managed gigabit ethernet switch. The ethernet switch is available in a rack mount and DIN rail models, and offers Gigabit and 100Base connectivity options in both copper and fiber. Other features include: expanded shock and vibration tolerances; extreme operating temperature range; redundant power input options; configuration backup; and an onboard temperature sensor to ensure maximum reliability.
Iconics, Inc. (www.iconics.com) announced updates to multiple products supporting wind power applications, including the Quality AnalytiX V10.8 software studio that provides SQC/SPC data analysis, and Wind AnalytiX software for integration of energy and meter sources into one unified platform with real-time monitoring. The Wind AnalytiX also includes a data historian, distribution alarm management and valuable overall equipment efficiency (OEE) reporting. The company also launched its new MobileHMI solutions for Microsoft Surface devices running Windows RT, Windows 8 phones, iPads, iPhones and Android devices.
