SkySails Power’s Innovative Airborne Wind Systems

Mark Hoppe, VP of Public Affairs & Business Development at
SkySails Power, discusses their containerized airborne wind energy
system. The innovative technology captures high-altitude winds with
kite-based systems, producing up to 50% more yield than traditional
turbines. Mark delves into the operational mechanics, deployment in
remote and island nations, and future market expansion. Sign up now
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technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard
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YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the
show? Email us! Allen Hall: With traditional wind turbines,
limited by location and high material costs, the industry needs
innovative solutions for clean energy in remote areas. This week we
speak with Mark Hoppe at SkySails Power. SkySails has developed a
containerized airborne wind energy system that captures high
altitude winds with unique kite technology producing up to 50% more
yield than conventional turbines while being deployable nearly
anywhere on the planet. Stay tuned. Welcome to Uptime Spotlight,
shining Light on Wind. Energy's brightest innovators. This is the
Progress Powering tomorrow. Allen Hall: Mark, welcome to the
podcast. Mark Hoppe: Yeah, thanks, man. Nice to be here. Allen
Hall: I've been looking to talk to you for. Ooh, going on at least
two years because I saw SkySails in Hamburg at the Hamburg Wind
Energy Show, and I thought, wow, this is really cool. And then, and
the display was [00:01:00] good and the information was good. I
just didn't know how much effort had gone into it at that point.
And, and we're two years further along, obviously. The SkySails
technology and the problem you're solving is really fascinating
because there's a lot of places on the planet that could use wind
energy, but a standard horizontal axis wind turbine is probably the
not the right approach, and diesel ends up being the winner on a
lot of these places. Mark Hoppe: That's a problem. Definitely,
definitely. So yeah, our technology solves a lot of these problems,
but of course our technology is not just meant for these kind of
places. So this is the entry point where we go in as, these places,
they've faced a lot of issues when it comes to logistics, prices of
the diesel because of the transport costs. That also includes in,
in the diesel prices, which then makes the diesel even, even
pricier. So, and due to, they have to spend a lot, a lot of money
on the diesel. Then they have the issue that they don't have
[00:02:00] the money for social development, for example. 'Cause
they have to subsidize their power prices and all this comes along.
 So what we have as a solution for that problem is that we
have a containerized wind power system. It's so-called airborne
wind energy system which uses the high altitude wind, which is more
powerful. So we fly in heights between two and 400 meters,
sometimes even higher. It depends on the width direction and
everything.  And due to that we can use the higher wind and
then produce 50% more yield than the typical wind turbine at the
same size. So that's crazy. Allen Hall: Yes, that's, that's really
good. I think the technology and the approach is innovative. So
the, the solution to get rid of all the dependence on diesel and
some of these electric grids that are very unreliable is to put in
basically electric [00:03:00] generation through a, a kite in the
sense the technology seems. Relatively simple, but I've looked at
this up close. There's actually a lot of technology here because
the system itself is really containerized. It's like dropping a
diesel generator on site somewhere, but except it's a kite.
Instead, you wanna explain basically how the system operates and
what someone would see if they're watching it work? Mark Hoppe:
Yeah, sure, sure, sure. So basically we, we always divide it into
two subsystems more or less. So we have the ground station, which
is a container. It's a 30 feet container, so you can ship
everywhere and just need one truck to to, to actually transport it
somewhere. So this is really easy. And then you have the flying
system. And the flying system at the ground station, they're
connected via the start and landing mass. And the start and landing
mast, so in, in the front of the start and landing mast, you have
the kites. So when the start and landing mast goes up, [00:04:00]
the in floating wind unfolds the kite and then the, the, the wind
takes the kite upwards. And underneath the kite you have a robota,
you can call it, we call it the control po.  It's, you can
compare it to a paraglide pilot more or less. And there you have an
autopilot who steers to the whole system. Then what does is, I
don't know, have you, have you ever been kite surfing before? Allen
Hall: Yeah, I've seen it, yes. Mark Hoppe: Yeah, so, so when you
have kite surfing, you, you try to fly your kite in, in the
so-called power zone, 'cause you have the wind window, so in the
middle of it you have the power zone there, you have the most force
and the autopilot does the same. So it actually tries to fly inside
the power zone all the time. So you have a lot of force on the, on
the tether. And when the tether is unwind from the, from the winch
inside the ground station, the rotational energy is converted into
electricity, [00:05:00] and then you have 800 meter long tether on
the drum. And then when, when the 800 meters gone all the way out,
the autopilot takes back the kite in nose dive, so it actually
pitches the kite and then it falls down from the sky, and then it
has, yeah, nearly no force. Then the generator X as a motor wheels
in the, the tether again. And then when the autopilot is at a
hundred meter, it starts all over.  So you can compare it to a
yo-yo, you know. Allen Hall: That's a very good analogy. So the
kite deploys out several hundred meters, 800 meters. Providing
energy because of that pull force, turning a generator. And then
in, when it reaches this extended length, it basically simplifies
itself, lowers the drag, comes back in and repeats it. So does,
does that create continuous power then, or how does it handle the,
the inward time in terms of. Power production? Is there a battery
involved? What does that [00:06:00] look like? Mark Hoppe: Yeah, so
we always deliver our system in different configurations. So a
little bit depends on this site conditions. So of course you can
use it off-grid. So what we would do then is we always deliver. So
our system comes in a 30 feet container, and then you have another
smaller container where you have a grid converter or a battery pack
inside. And then so what we do with this solution is that we can
always comply to the grid code but also of course can deliver an
off grid system. So you can either store the energy produced or use
it direct or grid connect the whole system and then feed it into
the grid. So that's, that's up to our customers on this side. Joel
Saxum: I think that one of the important things here to think
about, like in the beginning of this conversation of how this thing
looks, how it operates in the field, is that it [00:07:00] is
modularized, right? Like you've guys have taken the smart approach
of putting this in a container because a lot of the places that
this technology can be used can be on demand. Hey, I, in my mind,
I'm thinking disaster response. I'm thinking military uses, remote
microgrids. Like we have, we've had on the podcast before Hatch.
Hatch works with a lot of First Nations up in Canada where they're
in these really remote places. It's hard to get infrastructure in
there, but if you can bring this in on a truck, great. Right, so
there's a lot of places around the world, and I know this is,
that's just one use case, right? These remote, these Caribbean
islands, like Allen was saying. Diesel generators, but they're
paying exorbitant amounts of cost for fuel. So this thing, this
and, and the fact that you can switch over to different grids
right. So different her hertz ratings and voltages coming out.
Really important. So where have you guys been able to deploy the
system so far? Mark Hoppe: So, so [00:08:00] far, and, and so far
we have been installing systems. So we have one system in, in
northern Germany, which is our research development side also.
 And that one has also been grid connected now for five years.
More or less and also been operating since then, but we use it for
short durations in our the research development cycle. Then we have
another system which has been installed Mauritius for now, also two
and a half, three years, something.  Also grid connection,
which has been operated all the time because of duration tests. So
we actually get some figures about, okay, how last. How lasting are
materials and what do we need to do to make them even last longer?
So we learned a lot in the, in the past years on that. And now we
take all this into our product development cycles, and now we have
another two systems [00:09:00] which are now being delivered to
Taiwan. So the next installations will be in Taiwan, and then. We
have some projects going on in the Philippines, Cape Words Hawaii.
So all, all of these like island states and island nations, they,
they, we were really active in these spaces right now. French
Polynesia is also really interesting so far remote places. And all
these island states, they have a bigger issue. They have a really
big issue 'cause they're feeling the, the climate crisis first. So
they need to solve it. And also, and, and also what, what we are
look also looking into, which is a really interesting market, is
the Caribbean.  Because there you have the same issues.