Siemens 10,000 New Hires, GE Vernova Norway Turbine, Invenergy and Patria Investimentos Acquire Brazilian Portfolio

Siemens Energy has announced plans to hire 10,000 new employees
over the next six years as part of a $1.3 billion investment to
boost its grid technologies business. GE Vernova has received
approximately $30 million in funding from the Norwegian state
agency Enova to build a prototype 15.5 MW offshore wind turbine.
Invenergy and Patria Investimentos have jointly acquired a
600-megawatt wind power portfolio in Brazil. The U.S. Department of
the Interior has announced an offshore wind energy lease sale in
the Central Atlantic, scheduled for August 14, 2024. Sign up now
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technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard
Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape
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https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech -
www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.com Allen
Hall: I'm Allen Hall, president of Weather Guard Lightning Tech,
and I'm here with the founder and CEO of IntelStor, Phil Totaro,
and the chief commercial officer of Weather Guard, Joel Saxum. And
this is your newsflash newsflash is brought to you by our friends
at IntelStor. If you want market intelligence that generates
revenue, then book a demonstration of IntelStor at intelstor.com.
Siemens energy has announced plans to hire 10, 000 new employees
over the next six years as part of a 1. 3 billion investment to
boost its grid technologies business. The company aims to
capitalize on growing demand for electricity and grid equipment.
The new hires will be spread across Europe. The US, India, and
other parts of Asia and Latin America. Siemens Energy's grid
technologies unit has seen orders more than double in recent years
from 7. 6 billion in 2021 to 16. 3 billion in 2023. Okay, Phil.
There's a lot happening on the electricity grid market besides on
the renewable wind turbine solar panel side. Looks like Siemens
Energy is taking advantage of that. Philip Totaro: Their thermal
business is still going pretty strong. Obviously the wind business
is not so strong. But this is what we call in the industry kind of
a classical pivot. Which is to say if you can't sell your wind
turbines, then let's figure out how to do something else in the
meantime. While the wind division gets its act together. So this is
something that's actually going to help facilitate future sales by
ensuring that they've got more grid related technology deployed.
And since there's so much grid modernization necessary around the
world and just new greenfield build out of. Needed transmission,
particularly to help facilitate wind. I think this eventually is,
is gonna, play right into the hands of their power generation
business units. Joel Saxum: Yeah. As Siemens Energy looks to do a
little bit of recovery in the wind sector from this past few years,
I think. Think there's a pretty good strategic play here, right? If
you're them and you're talking to some large grid operator or a
utility, and it looks like they're going to, he's have some BOP
money to spend and build a new wind farm. Well, why not package it
all up? Let's sell them wind farm, let's sell them BOP, grid
integration and grid technology kit as well. So these two things
could play together. This is also on the heels of one of their
biggest competitors, Schneider electric being, being named the most
sustainable company in their sector in the world. Allen Hall: GE
Vernova has received approximately 30 million in funding from the
Norwegian state agency Innova to build a 15. 5 megawatt offshore
wind turbine. The turbine will be installed on land at the Bergland
based in Norway and tested for up to five years starting in 2025.
After testing, it's expected to produce electricity for another 25
years. This project aims to advance offshore wind technology and
reduce costs for floating offshore wind in the long term. Phil, why
is GE testing a turbine in Norway when they have other facilities
to test an offshore wind turbine? Philip Totaro: Yeah, obviously
with, with the grant that's been provided here by Innova, it
obviously makes it attractive to want to place this in, in Norway.
GE does have some history in, in Norway vis a vis offshore wind.
Probably history they'd prefer to maybe forget a little bit with
the acquisition of ScanWind, but It looks like this is going to be
an opportunity, Norway is trying to be a test bed for a lot of
different technology platforms. The first floating wind was done
in, floating offshore wind was done in Norway. The Tetris bar
technology is being developed and tested in, in Norway. And now
this gives GE an opportunity to also get a new prototype up and
running so that they can demonstrate the Capabilities of this
larger machine to the wider European market presumably they're
going to have some, they already have some sales in the U. S. for
this product model and they're going to get installed over here
and, and tested, but they don't actually for, for G. E. S. offshore
business, they have sales for the the Haliot X, 12, 13 megawatt
platform in Europe. At this point, they don't have anything firm
yet for the 15. 5 megawatt platform. So this is kind of a necessary
step, I think, in order for them to, demonstrate to the wider
market throughout Europe that they've, they've got a viable product
here. Joel Saxum: Yeah, I say that's something that technology
companies run into all the time that to the internally to them
seems kind of silly. If it works in US waters, it's more than
likely going to work over in European waters. But hey, we hear
these arguments all the time. An interesting thing here as well is
in this article they state the project aims to advance offshore
wind technology and reduce costs for floating offshore in the long
term. So it may be that this 15. 5 megawatt machine is going to be
a floating focused machine. Allen Hall: U. S. clean energy
developer Invenergy and Patria Investimentos, a Brazilian
investment manager, have jointly acquired a 600 megawatt wind power
portfolio in Brazil. The portfolio includes four wind farms located
in the northeastern Brazilian states. Invenergy will hold a 10
percent stake and manage operations and maintenance, while Patria
Investimentos will own the remaining 90%. That wind farms output is
being sold to local distribution companies through a long term
contract. Now, Phil, Invenergy is a huge developer in the United
States. Is this their first foray down in Brazil? Philip Totaro:
Officially, yes. So they, they've actually been looking at
different project sites globally including throughout Europe, a
little bit in Asia. And they've also kind of explored Australia as,
as a potential market. What's interesting, though, is that Contour
Global and Electrobras which are selling these projects, were
originally just going to sell them to Patria without anybody coming
in as, as a partner. They went out and got Invenergy as a partner
in kind of a very symbiotic relationship for them because as we've
talked about before on the show, you've got a lot of companies that
are financially and investment focused that don't have the
operational experience, bringing in somebody like Invenergy brings
that operational discipline to bear and Patria's got a lot more
capital to deploy. And there are plenty of projects in Brazil that
are. Still looking to get built or potentially looking to get
repowered as they're coming up now on the beginning of a, a
repowering market, which is, 20 years plus in, in asset age or with
assets that are 20 years plus in, in asset age. So. It's, it's
looking pretty promising. If this is going to be the first of, of
several new steps for, for both companies. Joel Saxum: Yeah. It
looks like if you look at the breakdown of the percentages,
Invenergy will hold a 10 percent stake. So it's very, very much a
minority stake. However, that increases our bottom line, right?
That's just operations and maintenance revenue. It's like almost
like signing a nice FSA for them and getting a little bit of equity
on the tail end is what it looks like to me, at least. This is
interesting as well, because I know. Talking with you, Phil, and
our different friends in Brazil, there has been quite a bit of
market changes down there with some OEMs pulling some resources out
and some other things. So the fact that invent energy is going down
there and jumping out into this one is is interesting. And I think
it's a, could be a good move on their part because a lot of those
turbines down there are. Fairly new in that market. And as they
keep getting their toes wet in the market, they may be able to
expand into some of those on an FSA standpoint. Allen Hall: The U S
department of the interior has announced an offshore wind energy
lease sale in the central Atlantic scheduled for August 14th. The
areas to be auctioned could generate up to 6. 3 gigawatts of clean
energy, potentially powering 2. 2 million homes. The sale includes
two lease areas, one offshore Delaware and Maryland, and another
offshore Virginia. This initiative is part of the Biden Harris
administration's efforts to expand offshore wind energy
opportunities and combat climate change. Now Phil, it does seem to
be a lot of leases being auctioned. At the moment, how is this one
going to impact the 30 gigawatts by 2030? Philip Totaro: Oh, we're
still not going to get there unfortunately, but we're at least,
putting the mechanisms in place, we've got 13 gigawatts now that
it's approved again, 30 by 30 was what they said originally they
wanted to build, then they changed it to say, well, we're going to
permit that. They can theoretically,