Taiwan Offshore Cable Damage & Japan’s Floating Wind Center

The crew discusses Husum Wind, Arthwind's blade consulting work
featured in PES Wind, and a major cable damage incident at Taiwan's
Greater Changhua offshore wind project. They also cover Japan's
plans for a national floating wind test center, Australia's
offshore wind development struggles, and feature Scotland's Moray
West wind farm as the Wind Farm of the Week. 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
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YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the
show? Email us! Speaker: [00:00:00] You are
listening to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast brought to you by build
turbines.com. Learn, train, and be a part of the Clean Energy
Revolution. Visit build turbines.com today. Now, here's your hosts.
Allen Hall, Joel Saxum, Phil Totaro, and Rosemary Barnes. 
Allen Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I'm
your host, Allen Hall, and I'm here with Joel Saxum up in the great
state of Wisconsin. Phil Totaro is in California, and Rosemary
Barnes is here, but she's in a vehicle in Australia somewhere. But
there has been a tremendous amount of news over the last couple of
days, and I think we should talk about some of them. Uh, I guess
it's, it's a where the group would like to go. This week, guys, you
know, we've been talking about the administration for the last
several weeks and about administration out, uh, the latest is with,
uh, the administration in [00:01:00]court about Empire Wind.
Do you want to even talk about that stuff this week or do you wanna
move on to some things? A little happier? Let's do happier. Alan. I
think we should, we need some different news. I feel the same way,
Joel, you know, uh, when this podcast comes out, everybody's,
everybody's gonna be in Husam, Germany having a great time, uh,
talking wind energy, particularly in Europe. And it sounds like
that event is gonna be bonkers from what I can tell on
LinkedIn.  Joel Saxum: Yeah. The, I mean, HU is only
second to Hamburg right in, in Germany there. Everybody that I go,
they enjoy it. Husam is like the, the. Correct me if I'm wrong,
Phil, but I think it was like the first place they had onshore wind
in a big way in Germany. Phil Totaro: Yes. So it's vestus, um,
put up a factory there, uh, and was selling wind turbines to
farmers. It's also where they used to do, the reason that it's
there is they used to do an agriculture. Um, event and then they
used to invite some of the wind guys. This is going back to like
the, you know, late eighties, early nineties. [00:02:00] They
used to invite the wind guys, or the wind guys used to show up to
try and sell turbines at this agriculture event. The amount of
people interested in wind got to such an extent that they started
doing a separate wind event. Um, and it got. Before they started
the separation with the, the Wind Energy Hamburg, um, event, they,
uh, that got to a point, I mean, I remember being there in what,
2015 or 2016 when it had to have been. 30,000 people in a field in
Huso. You know, I, my best memory of it, I think was when, uh, well
it was eon at the time, but, uh, they had a guy running around,
passing out hot dogs. And I had a eon hotdog.  Joel
Saxum: Phil, I wanted to share with you. This was a Deutsche
Wind Technique show, San Antonio a CP. They had margaritas with the
Deutsche Wind Technique logo in the margarita, like foam, the foam
on top of the margarita once, and they were passing those out at an
event. I thought that was spot on.  Phil Totaro: The hot
dogs [00:03:00] are not branded in any way, although that
would've been a good idea to like, you know, stamp the button or
something.  Joel Saxum: What, how do we do that for
weather guy to the next event? How we have like lightning bolt
popsicles or something? Oh,  Allen Hall: I'm sure that
can happen. Lightning bolt cookies, maybe. Well, cookies. We all
love cookies. Who doesn't love good chocolate chip cookie? You know
who told me about Husam first was Lars Benson and at AC 8 83 and he
described it as just a. Complete craziness in the middle of a
field. You had to go rent a house to stay there. But it was a heck
of a lot of fun. And I thought, well, if Lars is having fun, it
must be really fun. 'cause  Phil Totaro: Lars likes to
have fun. I used to have to take the train on a daily basis from
Hamburg because there was no way you could even get a house or a
hotel. It was so busy, uh, in, in that little town. Um. So, yeah,
it was, it was quite an experience and they've eventually worked
out all the logistics. 'cause they used to not even have like,
shuttle service from the train station to the event. Um, but there
were so many people that demanded it that they
started [00:04:00] adding these kind of amenities, uh,
which, which was nice.  Joel Saxum: I did wanna share
this one. Uh, you mentioned, uh, Lars Benton, Alan, um, Lars and
the team over at a CA 83. Recently Lars stepped, stepped into the
executive chair and handed over the. The main keys to the
organization to Yannick, so Yannick Benson, the new CEO at a C 83.
So a little bit of a management change up there in Canada. That
company growing, selling spare parts, doing blade work, doing
service work, all kinds of good things. Allen Hall: Yeah, if
you need spare parts, you better be calling Yannick. It's, it's
spare parts are hard to get at the moment and I know Yannick and
Lars have connections and places you can't get to, so it's a good
place to reach out to AC 8 83. Just in time for a husam. The new
PES win magazine is out. This thing is heavy. It's full of great
articles and I've been thumbing through it, uh, recognizing a lot
of people that I know in the magazine and that's awesome. Uh, but
Joel pointed out that, uh, Amond Costa Rego [00:05:00] is
in it from Earth Wind. And, and Arthur Wind is, we've, we talked to
Armando a couple of months ago, Joel, down in Nashville. That seems
like an eternity ago.  Joel Saxum: Yeah, I'll tell you
what, uh, Armando night chat quite regularly. We're on the WhatsApp
telling jokes, talking family stuff off and on, and that man is
everywhere. Uh, I talked to him last week. He was in Mexico. He was
in Chile. He was in Argentina at all the wind events. He's got
wind, uh, power Brazil coming up. I know he's doing a big thing
with the ARS wind team down there for that. He was at a CP
Nashville. He, for OMS, he was at a CP in Phoenix. He's like every
event everywhere. He's there every, no matter what Europe. South
America, it doesn't matter. Um, but yeah, the article they're
showcasing, of course what Earth Wind does is as a blade
consultant, they're top tier. They've got a large team. They have a
lot of experience inside the factories, um, auditing blades as
they're coming off the lines. Internal inspections, external
inspections, blade expertise. Uh, they've got
their [00:06:00] own platform, ARS Next, which is kind
of, um, it's, it's, it's solid, right? It's good. Yeah. It's good
stuff for, uh, validating repairers realtime feedback. Um, I know
they got some little AI engines for chat bots and stuff in there.
They're doing some, some really cool things. Um, so, and if you
haven't, if you've met r Armando, you've probably also met our good
friend Rodolfo, uh, who is, who is a. A strong right hand for
Armando and uh, that team down there is, um, they're doing big
things in Brazil. Allen Hall: Yeah, a lot of great things
happening at Earth, wind, and they are worldwide. If you need help
with inspections or technology, or blade management or turbine
management. Earth Wind is definitely a place to check out, and you
also need to check out PES Wind, so if you haven't downloaded your
copy, you can go to PS wind.com and download your copy today. As
Wind Energy Professionals, staying informed is crucial, and let's
face it difficult. That's why the Uptime podcast recommends PES
Wind Magazine. PES [00:07:00] Wind offers a diverse range
of in-depth articles and expert insights that dive into the most
pressing issues facing our energy future. Whether you're an
industry veteran or new to wind, PES Wind has the high quality
content you need. Don't miss out. Visit PES wind.com today. You
wanna talk about cables? You wanna talk about storage batteries? I
think we should do the, the cables and batteries. You pick the
order.  Rosemary Barnes: Yeah. I mean, they relate. I'm
sure one will flow into the other.  Allen Hall: Well, if
more things could not go wrong, forested at the minute, and I know,
uh, we're watching Orid all the time, watching the stock price,
watching them get their feet back underneath of them. Stead has a
lot of projects still going on today, and I think everybody forgets
about that, that they're a worldwide company and they're doing
great things all over. Uh, but they had a setback in Taiwan, so an
export cable was damaged at the greater Chenwa two B offshore wind
project, uh, which is going to push back the completion of that
project. To sometime in [00:08:00] late 2026, it's about
a 300 million Danish kroner hit on the, on the revenue chain, uh,
which is about $50 million. It's not a huge deal, but when I read
this article, Joel, the first thing I was, I thought about you
saying that on offshore, the biggest risk isn't the actual
turbines, it's the cable, and there's a lot of damaged cable as
they're deploying 'em. What likely happened here in Taiwan? 
Joel Saxum: Well, it's an in, I think the first off, it's
interesting that they're taking the hit. I, I don't, I think that's
the, the headline, but that's gotta be an insurance policy that's
covering this.