Ørsted Settles in NJ, Vestas Restructures, Belgium Objects to French Offshore Wind Farm

Ørsted and New Jersey settle their dispute over cancelled offshore
wind farms, Belgium objects to a French offshore wind farm near
Dunkirk, Vestas merges its technology and manufacturing divisions,
a new blade root bushing repair method is patented by We4Ce, and
details on NextEra's Hubbard Wind Project in Texas. 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: Over in the UK, and this is the only place where I think this
would Obviously occur for multiple reasons. Adam Spencer, a serial
thief from Sutton in Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, was recently caught
and sentenced after a string of burglaries and shoplifting
incidents. Most notable theft, 17 tubes of Pringles potato chips,
all stolen in one go. When arrested by police, Spencer reportedly
quipped, Once you pop, you can't stop. A reference to Pringle's
famous advertising slogan. But Prince's crime spree went beyond
just chips. He broke into the same Iceland shop twice in one
morning, stealing meat and then returning a couple hours later to
steal over 300 pounds worth of additional stock. Okay this is gonna
become the Pringle's defense. It has to be, right? Once you pop,
you can't stop. I like it. Rosemary are we would call them potato
chips in the United States, but they're called other things in
other places. Are they popular in Australia? Rosemary Barnes: No,
they're they're chips in Australia. They're crisps in the UK. Joel
Saxum: Are they popular and or would you be willing to steal 17
tubes of them? Rosemary Barnes: I certainly wouldn't. Wouldn't
steal them. It's hard to imagine how you could sneak out 17 tubes
of Pringles in one go. So that's, obviously I guess they, they
didn't because they were caught, but yeah, no, I think, I don't
know with chips, I I don't like them particularly, but if they're
there, I'll eat them and then regret it. So I would not. I would
not keep 17 tubes in my house because there's, it's hard to, It's
hard to eat healthy foods while you've got Pringles available. Even
if I don't like them. I don't, yeah, I guess ones you probably
can't stop. Allen Hall: A Belgian minister has joined several
coastal municipalities in filing an objection against a large wind
farm off the coast of Dunkirk, France. And if you remember Dunkirk,
France is the place where the British removed all their coal.
Troops at the beginning of world war two very famous place The
plans would build 46 wind turbines barely 10 kilometers from the
coast which Belgian authorities say would cause visual nuisance
impact shipping routes and harm protected seabirds Belgium has been
opposing this Project since 2016 has proposed an alternate location
further out to sea if necessary Belgium is prepared to go to the
European court to safeguard the rights of coastal residents and
other stakeholders Okay, guys, so when you decide to build an
offshore wind farm along your border You have to anticipate if the
country or the other side is going to have some concerns about it,
right? Particularly in Dunkirk France, which is a very next to
Belgium, which is quite beautiful You it's just like the coastline
of New Jersey that and Virginia and everywhere else in the United
States where the sight lines can't be interrupted. Six, 10
kilometers, which is six miles, right? Six miles isn't that far
offshore. Joel Saxum: How do they navigate this? I'd be the like to
be the first one to say that if we're gonna take a uptime podcast
field trip to visit a coastline I would much rather go to the
northern coast of France than New Jersey. Philip Totaro: You beat
me to it. I was gonna say something about New Jersey. They're not
the same. Rosemary Barnes: Have you seen the movie Dunkirk? That
place is bleak. You watch the movie Dunkirk and you're like, yeah,
holiday destination. Joel Saxum: Even Rosemary knows. So Allen, I
know you and I, when we were talking, I think it was when it was
the Virginia wind farms, Commonwealth or something of that sort,
where we were actually doing the math with the curvature of the
earth and how far off the the beach, the turbines need to be if
you're six feet tall before you can't see them anymore. And they're
just going to be specks out there and all this stuff. We did that.
So this one, 10 kilometers off the coast, that's six miles. You'll
still be able to see them fairly clear. If they've, I guess the way
I see it is if they've proposed another spot, that's a little bit
further out. And if it doesn't change the economics of the project
too much, then I would just move it out. And that, if that was my
development decision, just make it easier because otherwise you're
running into so many stakeholders that you got to have a piece and
they're just going to fight and fight, they've been fighting it for
eight years already. Philip Totaro: Look at the end of the day this
sort of thing happens all the time with onshore wind as well.
Somebody's got an easement in place to put a wind turbine, but it's
gonna cast a shadow on the neighbor's, backyard and diminish their
enjoyment of their property or some nonsense like that. So it's
just buy them off and move on. At the end of the day, you're seeing
Allen Hall: France should buy Belgium. I don't know if that's
possible. Philip Totaro: No, FRA What France is gonna do is they're
gonna give a contract to Deme and you know that's gonna take care
of it. And then everybody's happy. Deme is Belgian anyways, aren't
they? Yeah, that's what I mean. France is gonna give a contract to
DE and then they get some tax revenue off and then everybody goes
home happy. This is a, it doesn't have to be an issue. But the
Belgians keep making it an issue. Joel Saxum: If they keep delaying
it, the turbines are going to get taller and taller anyways. If
they would have just built it back in 2016, I think those were only
six megawatt direct drives back then or something, weren't they?
Should have built it then. Allen Hall: Over in New Jersey, speaking
of New Jersey, Danish wind farm developer Orsted will pay New
Jersey 125 million. To settle claims over the company's
cancellation of two onshore wind farms last year. This settlement
amount is just over a third of the 300 million ORSID was once
required to pay in guarantees and development obligations. The
state will use the settlement funds to support investments in wind
energy facilities, component manufacturing facilities, and other
clean energy programs. All right, everybody. Do you think New
Jersey's really going to use 125 million for clean energy
investments? Joel Saxum: It would be nice if you, if it would go
into some fund that could, fund some loans or something of that
sort, but I, but the trouble with this and most all other federal
funds in general, regard that it's green, transparency is usually
an issue. So if they would put this up on a simple to use website
that would be nice and transparent where you could take a peek at
where the funds are being used. That would be fantastic. But I
doubt that's going to happen. Allen Hall: The Orsted lawyers earned
their money for sure. They knocked it down by 175 million. That's a
nice job well done. Hopefully they take a percentage of that home.
Still, these situations. Are going to arise again and again, and I
wonder at what point will the developers stop getting involved in
this like this down payment thing that the states require when the
states hold all the cards and in New Jersey's case, pretty much
made it untenable for Orsted to move forward on these projects.
It's feels like you're bludgeoning them and then encourage him to
come over for some more bludgeoning. And there's nothing that the
developer can do. They're trying to play nice. And at some point
they, they're. And true New Jersey nature and some point of
watching enough mobster movies It feels like they're just gotten
whacked, right? It's it is a really not a good look for New Jersey
and Orsted You know from I have to give Orsted some credit here,
right? That Orsted PR wise It's done a pretty good job of this.
Joel Saxum: In the article here that we're referring to they say
some environmentalists have criticized the settlement as a sellout,
saying the state basically gave up or gave in to Orsett. The end of
the day here, those states on the East Coast, while they're
fighting and fighting, they all still say within their policies
that they want to have a settlement. offshore wind as a clean
energy, renewable energy source. So if they're going to, if they
were going to force Orsted to pay that 300 million and keep
pushing, if I was Orsted, I'd move my capital down to the next
state. I wouldn't deal with them anymore. So there's a reason.
Rosemary Barnes: But I don't understand the environmentalist angle
here. Shouldn't that be. Pro wind, if they're environmentalists why
are they pro New Jersey, and Joel Saxum: It's the pro whale, or the
pro bird, or, yeah. It's a really, it's a really, it's really quite
a fight in the U. S. right now. Rosemary Barnes: The
environmentalists who are opposing wind farms on the basis of whale
deaths I don't, I wouldn't call them environmentalists, because
there isn't any basis in fact to that. I think it's, at best, I
Maybe there's some naive environmentalists in there who, love
whales and don't have very good reading comprehension or something
to be able to look into it a bit further,