Thomas Schlegl, founder of Eologix sensor technology, sat down with us to talk about how their ice detection sensors increase wind turbine safety and allow for more efficient wind turbine management and production via automatic shutoffs and restarts. When turbines on a wind site start accumulating ice, local regulations may call for them to be shut down due to the fear of throwing ice, increased blade noise or other factors. With quality, direct detection, operators can have their turbines shut down and restarted automatically, saving the time and expense of maintenance crews to go perform the same job. Listen in as we talk through how the sensors work and how they’re best deployed. Watch this episode on YouTube here.
Follow up with Eologix via their website and on their company Linkedin page and connect with Thomas personally on Linkedin.
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. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!
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Transcript: EP59 – Eologix Ice Detection Sensor Technology with Thomas Schlegl
Dan: This episode is brought to you by weather guard, lightening tech at weather guard, we make wind turbine lightning protection easy. If you’re a wind farm operator, stop settling for damaged turbine blades and constant downtime. Get your uptime back with our strike table lightening protection system.
Learn more in today’s show notes or visit weather guard, wind.com/strike tape.
Welcome back. I am Alan Hall. I’m Dan Blewett. And this is the uptime podcast where we talk about wind energy engineering, lightning protection, and ways to keep your wind turbines running.
All right, welcome back to the uptime podcast. I’m your co-host Dan blew it. No Allen hall today, but we’ve got a great guest, uh, Dr. Thomas Schlegl. He’s the founder. And managing director from Eologix and they are an ice detection sensor company, uh, with some really interesting IP. So we’ve talked about, uh, in subsequent episodes, you know, the whole Texas, uh, you know, ice disaster from January of 2021, and we’ve covered it from different angles.
You know, we talked to, uh, Brian from elemental codings talk about some upcoming, you know, ice, um, ice shedding coatings that allow ice to sloth off a blade. A lot faster. We’ve talked to a laissez Hill. He had to co from Weiss tech with their, uh, blade heating technology. And so we’ve, we’ve gotten a good idea of like some of the different ways to keep ice off your blades.
Um, but today they’re, uh, their technology Eologix is about, uh, ice detection. And, you know, this is going to allow. Operators to automatically stop and start their turbines when it’s, uh, you know, safety regulations tell them that they have to, and if they don’t have a heating technology, that’s going to be their solution rise to stop their blades.
Uh, you know, wait till tomorrow warms up or the next day or whatever, and then get them operating again. Um, and that’s going to make the most sense for a lot of climates and, and some wind farms. So illogic has, it has interesting technology. Um, there’s a essentially, it’s, it’s almost like a big sticker.
They can stick it on the blade. Um, you can put it on every turbine in your site or a handful depending, you know, just on, what’s going to be best for it. And you could also put it on, uh, potentially, uh, turbines that are closer to say a, uh, you know, a residential area or a trail or somewhere where again, there might be more human safety concerns from throwing, you know, ice, getting thrown, uh, et cetera, et cetera.
So. You know, one of the things that makes this tech pretty interesting is that it’s not measuring just atmospheric conditions and sort of predicting or guessing, but it’s actually directly measuring, uh, the ice accumulation on the blade. So this is unique to their company to Eologix and, uh, it’s something that.
Potentially, it could really be a game changer for, for wind farms that are struggling with having to send technicians out, to manually stop and start the turbines. And they’re just maybe not getting the quality of data that they might otherwise get from something that’s actually like a direct measurement, not just again, an atmospheric or altered for sound kind of measurement.
So, uh, again, really interesting conversation with, with Thomas today. So without further ado, let’s go to Thomas Schlegl, managing director and founder of ear logics sensor technology.
All right. Well, Thomas, thank you so much for joining us on the show today. We’re really excited to talk more about this. A wind turbine blade icing issue. Thank
Thomas: you, Dan, thank you for being here in the show.
Dan: So let’s get, let’s get going. So obviously Texas had a lot of icing problems back in January of 2021.
There were huge power outages, right? We’ve talked about this, uh, on the podcast here from a bunch of different angles with, you know, blade heating technology, um, coatings that can help reduce icing from elemental coatings, lots of different different avenues. We’ve talked about this, this problem. Cause it was so it was such a big deal, you know, in, in the U S when that ice storm hit.
Um, but we haven’t really talked about his ice sensors. And so you are with Eologix and you guys have some pretty unique, uh, intellectual property and your technology is, is actually really fascinating. So can you take us through a little bit about why detection is so important? Cause everyone thinks about, yeah, we need to keep ice off.
Like, does it even matter that we know it’s there? We just need to know why don’t we just blast them with heat all the time, but. Uh, it seems like the detection is just as important, if not more so important than actually having the heating in place. But can you take us through that a little bit? Why is detection, um, so critical for keeping these turbines, um, optimized?
Thomas: Yeah. Um, actually from our perspective, our point of view that detection is actually good, where everything started starts, right? So you need to detect ice to be efficient in removing the ice. That means, I mean, as I said, it might be possible to like hit the plate all the time, which is really costly and then, and not really efficient, but knowing that your plates are iced and that’s the very first, very important point to note that your plates are iced is, is the first step to then take, uh, steps.
Conscious steps to avoid or remove the ice from
Dan: the blades. So there’s been a lot of different types of technology. What, what right now is, is so different about your sort of stick on a poxy on, um, solution with Eologix what’s different
Thomas: about it. It’s actually that the direct measurement. So as I said before, you want to know.
The ice on the plates. It’s not, not enough to know that the temperature is below zero or maybe there is some moisture in the, in the air that, uh, that you have AC conditions. They’re very important stuff is that there is ice on the plates and. To be accurate with the measurement and the accuracy. You only get with direct measurement on the plates.
So, or the indirect measures like measuring on the naysayers or measuring vibrations of the plate or comparing the power output of the turbine. Like the power curve, uh, changes. It’s it’s just too inaccurate to be really efficient with, with plate heating or countermeasures against icing. And that’s where we at Eologix , uh, say that the direct measurement is of course the most efficient way and, and also the most accurate way to detect icing on the beds.
Dan: So, can you take me through the other ones and we don’t have to get into like your actual, you know, competing companies, but just one of the other different technologies. So you just mentioned atmospheric conditions, you can measure those. So, you know, we, we pretty much know when the cocktail is right for icing, right?
If it’s a certain temperature, um, certain little moisture in the air, um, but you also mentioned, uh, vibrations on the blade and ultrasound stuff like that. Can you give us kind of a quick overview of all the different types of ways that. We as an industry have been, um, detecting ice.
Thomas: Mm. So the, the, like, which is what is really long on the market is the, or are the nascent based measurements that starts with anemometer comparison.
So you have a heated anemometer and not TT anemometer. And if the one that is not heated starts to, uh, to change the rotational speed compared to the heated one, then your. Suggested there is icing. Uh, the other one is a vibrating buyer, uh, which is placed on the, uh, on the naysayer. And if this wire starts to ice, then this vibration frequency, uh, changes.
And again, it’s indication for icing conditions. And it’s not yet saying that there is icing on the blades. The other thing which is relate based is to vibration measurement stuff on the blades, where you measure the vibrations of a blade, you calculate in frequencies. And if the rate of the plate changes, yang frequencies change.
And with this aid frequency change you again, say that there has to be ice on the plate because by. And should the weight of the plate changes, uh, then because of ice. So that’s, I think that’s the most, most common ways of detecting ice. So the native based, which are there since I would say beginning of the 2000, uh, years, and then you have to vibration based system, which started a little bit after 2010.
And that’s where also your logic started in 2014. Obviously the direct measurement on the plates.
Dan: Gotcha. So, uh, I want to get back into, you know, why detection is so important. Um, but first let’s go more into, into what your logic’s does. So yours is direct and it’s a lot like, I mean, to me, it almost looks like one of those really high-tech bandages that you put on like a, like a burn or something where you it’s.
You know, you’re applying it to the blade. It’s got good. Um, you know, like sticky back adhesive, you’re going to edge seal. Uh, so it’s, it’s going to be on there. Um, but what’s, what are the key pieces of, without obviously I know you’ve some pretty interesting intellectual property, but what are some of the unique things, um, about your sensors?
Thomas: The nice thing is actually, and that’s maybe, um, uh, the size of the sensor that it’s, it’s really thin. So if you’re below two millimeters of thickness, that means that the sensor is flexible. So, and it’s completely wireless. It’s about the size of a, of a hand. And, uh, you, as you already said, they are stick like, like stickers on the plate, um, because they are so seen, there is no aerodynamic effect.
And they are directly stick on the outside of the plate as they are competitive ins. Uh, they have to get powered somehow and, and we use, uh, flexible solar cells on the sensors that power, the sensors. Additionally, there are battery, uh, better is on, it’s more, better effects for complete dark times. And that’s, but that’s really only necessary if you’re way up North.
So we have installations North of the port, Arthur, where you have more than, uh, maybe months of only great daylight, uh, where you get a on there, get less ambient light. And, and there you need this battery backup.
Dan: Yeah. So we’ve got some redundancy in there. It sounds like.
Thomas: Exactly. And then, and then you have the measurement area, which is based on a capacitive measurement principle.
That’s similar, actually, it’s the same measurement principles that order smartphones, like your EPR phone uses to detect that there is a finger and we use this technology to detect the ice and not only the ice, but also the thickness. And th the type of ice. So we can also distinguish between light, ramus and Tevye high mus, uh, JCS.
Dan: Hmm. Okay. So. It sounds like, you know, you said it’s really fast. It’s not going to really affect their dynamics. How’s it gonna hold up to some like leading edge erosion? Because obviously that’s one of the big, uh, things. We have a couple of robotics companies, uh, coming on the show, um, everyone’s trying to repair leading edge erosion, get ahead of it, you know, prevent it, um, you know, as yours going to get eaten up by, you know, years being on the blade.
And it seems like obviously this has got to perform really well in some pretty brutal conditions.
Thomas: We’re not really directly on the leading edge ordo on the pressure or suction side, but the erosion happens directly on the leading edge. And Isaac simulation normally starts a little bit off the stagnation point and that’s where the sensor is, is located.
And additionally, we are placed below, uh, an erosion protection tape. So the whole sensor comes below, uh, 3m erosion protection type, and that’s also protecting the sensor against erosion.
Dan: And so, I mean, I guess like the practical application here is that, you know, when, and, and these sensors are connected to the turbine itself where it can, it’ll just automatically start and stop it when it’s got ice.
Is that right? Or is it just alert somebody. And then they’ve got to take action. I mean, what’s the, what’s the latency there as far as detecting ice and like what’s the action item of, of the sensor itself.
Thomas: The nice thing we have to sensors is that suddenly as they detect ours, they’re not only say ICS or no.
So we have several sensors on the, on the plates and each sensor is delivering the sickness level of ice. They are transmitting the data to a receiver. The receiver is located in the Mason and, um, normally it’s, or usually it’s connected directly to the controller. The turbine, uh, controller then reacts on the, on the signal of the sensors and either stops the turbine or, and that is also very important.
Can automatically restart the turbine after ice conditions. Additionally, you have the possibility to control heating solutions. So if you already have a kind of core gamut package on a turbine and you have a heating, uh, you can use the sensors as it’s really, it can be really sensitive. You can also.
Realize functions as predictive feeding. And of course you can use the data from seven turbines to, to predict like big icing conditions. Uh, what we have, for example, as you said, in the introduction in, in, in Texas, in January, we are doing that actually already in Austria with, with the grid operator to give him information.
If, if several turbines. Have to be shut down due to icing and maybe further mater events or coming to a shutdown that this gives the information for the, for the grid operator. That soon there will be turbines going off the grid. And, and, and, and that helps for, for preventing, uh, such, uh, yeah. Power loss is
Dan: integrated.
Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. So I guess if people are trying to, you know, taper down and say, okay, we need a divert power from here and get more from here. Cause we’re going to lose a couple turbines in that mix. That makes good sense to kind of get ahead of it that way. I hadn’t really thought about that, um, prior to us talking, but that makes a lot of sense where you, like you said, you have a little bit of a predictive gap to, to get other power sources.
You know, to the forefront, you know, if you’re into that, that, uh, potential, like. Big time ice situation. That makes sense. Um, well, are you guys partnering with like other companies? Cause it seems like this whole thing is it’s not just like, this is the only thing you need to prevent blade icing. Right? It seems like there’s lots of different tools and I know we’re going to have, um, I think one of our, uh, our previous guests, um, back on the show to talk about aerodynamics and how power perv upgrades could even help keep them going when they have a little bit of, uh, ice accumulation on there.
Um, but like, I mean, how do you view the sort of a whole ecosystem, um, of like blade heating technologies and your sensor technology, and maybe like, even the coding’s like, which is really cool and sort of when the, uh, up and coming with, uh, elemental coatings, I mean, how do you see that whole thing working to where it makes good financial sense and, um, You know, do, do you see like all this changing where it’s going to be relatively easy with new technology, sort of working together to keep these, you know, to prevent another Texas situation from happening?
I mean, I,
Thomas: I think they have to be easy working otherwise nobody really will use them. And in terms of partnering, uh, we see a lot, or especially the sensors as a support us. For, for several other companies and, and, and areas for this, uh, coat climate, uh, package. So of course the OEMs, the manufacturers of the turbines with their heating solutions, the sensors can be, uh, supportive for efficient controlling.
The heating solutions for ice detection is already talked about, but also companies like, like WiseTech, uh, was in the show before, right? So we are cooperating with them. Or so additional heating solutions. Uh, they used the sensors for temperature control of the heating solution. So, or this conductive heating solutions normally are pretty sensitive.
They are high, efficient, so that it can heat up really fast, but they are also not allowed to get too hot, right. And sensor like our sensor that is measuring directly the surface, uh, ice sickness, but also the temperature can, can help to control this. This features, or of course you have also the, uh, the, the coatings and, uh, here, our sensor can easily be placed below such coating.
So we, uh, already were on vignettes of plates below this anti ice coatings, just to prove that they are really not effected
Dan: by icing. And so as far as like regulations, I mean, I’m sure, depending on the climate, depending on the country, like there are, there are regulations in place, right? For, for icing.
And when the turbines need to be shut down, can you go into that a little bit? Because obviously. No one wants to be shocking, you know, two kilogram pieces of ice into a neighboring community. Like, and that’s very realistic because of just how powerful these turbines are and how fast they spend. Um, so what are the, what are the implications for stopping and starting, you know, the turbines safely and like, what are some of the different regulations that have to be met?
Thomas: That, that it’s really country dependent. And, and even in countries like Germany, it’s, it’s even on a smaller, uh, reach, uh, different. But as I said, most of the times, it’s a safety issue that comes with the regulations. So you’re not allowed to operate the turbine. If there are some, uh, safety, uh, issues.
What is not allowed with ice is exactly the safety issue. So on the ice, but cheddar, um, but since level of ISS is allowed, because if it goes down, it’s, it’s more like snow, but you’re not allowed to have places on the turbine. As you said, two kilograms of ice for folding down, and maybe it’s throwing more than hundreds or three hundreds of meters away is, is definitely nothing you want to have.
And yeah, deregulations normally. Yeah, forced the, the end user or the operator owner of the turbines to use an ice detection system and turn off the turbine. If there are some safety issues and that’s actually deregulation, and then it’s up to the, to the, uh, to our customers or to the owners of, of, of turbines, how they mitigate this, this ice risks.
And
Dan: then, I mean, what, what’s the most common thing at the moment? So when we talked with lice tech, like most turbines don’t have blade heating, you know, installed at the moment. And of course there’s, you know, much of the, the installed capacity around the globe. Isn’t going to be in a country, you know, in a place where they’re even going to need it.
Right. There’s tons of them in warm climates throughout the year. Um, but to most, most turbines that have some sort of ice detection is, is there. Is there a thing just to turn them off and that’s like their solution, like we’re just going to shut them off when they’re iced, when the ice falls off or just like melts when the conditions are moved, then we just turn it back on.
Is that, is that pretty much the current solution for most wind farms?
Thomas: I think that’s the maturity of turbines to have two solutions and assume that downtime due to icing gets high enough. So that the economically, uh, pain, if you, if you put it like that, this is high enough, then like heating solutions going to be an option.
But the majority of turbines, as I said, don’t have a heating solution in there. If you have days below zero C, you might have icing. And then you, the first thing you have normally is an ice detector to turn off the turbine and then stop it. And when it. Temperature is, is buff zero again, or the ice is gone.
Uh, you restart the turbine again, then it, again, it’s a question of the, the number of events you have during a winter sometime it’s, it’s okay to manually restart the turbine because it’s only a few events or would have inter if it’s more than a few events, you might want to have a nice detector that also automatically restarts.
Your turbine because you don’t want to do it manually all the
Dan: time. Yeah. That makes sense. So this is going to prevent, um, your sensors will prevent them having to send a technician out there that Nick and just do it from like a control room. Is that right? And then, so like we talk a lot about data on the show.
Um, our cohost Allen who’s, who’s not here today, loves data, you know, hounds a huge, huge data guy. Um, so I feel like in his honor, I should ask you about, about, about data. Cause everyone, it seems like has their own dashboard or they’re, you know, they’re pumping the data where it could be accessed by the operator.
Um, or the technicians or whoever. So, I mean, what do you guys do as far as data is, is a really important in this case? Or is it really because to me, it sounds like, and this is just an outsider’s view that as long as the sensor turns it off, when it needs to be turned off, turns it back on when needs to be turned it back on, it seems like it might not need that much of like a data dashboard, but is that is my view, right?
Or off there it’s
Thomas: again, depending on the customer. So. There are many customers that are, Hey, if the detection is working and it turns off the turbine and it restarts the turbine, then it’s fine. I don’t need additional data. And then there are others who. Or maybe also bigger customers who want to do their own kind of research, want to evaluate icing on the turbines, want to know what happens on their plates.
They at least want to have the data, uh, because normally skater data in the turbine is, is not, uh, curated enough. So. For these ones, we of course also offer kind of a dashboard or an API for connection to their second, uh, leverage skater system. So they can have all these data like data from each individual sensor, if each individual ice level and temperature value.
Um, but that is really customer dependent.
Dan: Yeah. Gotcha. And then I’m assuming that this is something you’d want to have sensors on every single turbine. So if you have a wind farm with 60 turbines, you want sensors on every single one or is it just like on a couple? Um, how does it, how does it work as far as the layout
Thomas: goes?
I mean, as Eologix , of course prefer, would be, uh, sensors on each, on each turbine, but, uh, to be honest, it also depends on the terror. Uh, if it’s like a complex terror where the turbines really ice differently, uh, then it makes sense to have it on more turbines then maybe on the, on the corner turbines, it’s sometimes also a regulation topic.
Sometimes you need to equip the turbines that are close to a road or a path, a trail. Both as detectors. And, uh, sometimes the customer really only wants to take the corner turbines. And if this corner turbines ice, then he shuts off the horn. Oh,
Dan: so, and so when you mentioned that, you know, maybe if they’re close to a trail or something, is that just because they’d have more of like the potential to throw ice towards, you know, people
Thomas: exactly like a train, some bikers or people going, you don’t want to have ice throwing down on the, on the tray.
Dan: Yeah. And it’s weird because when I think of like a wind turbine throwing ice, It it to me like, you know, there’s not many things in life that actually throw ice, right? Like, you know, an ice icicle might fall for your building. Um, but in general, like you never come across, at least in like a normal person.
Who’s not working in like a heavy industry or something. Like any kind of like dangerous ice, but I mean, we’re talking about chunks that are like multiple kilograms where it’s essentially like throwing a brick. Right. And that’s what kind of what I’ve been thinking about. Like, I live in DC and there’s tons of brick, uh, sidewalks and streets and stuff.
And the idea of like a winter man chucking a brick across, across like neighborhood is tech is terrifying. Like that really could kill somebody, but it’s me, it’s like hard to get into that mindset of like, Oh, just like chucking some ice. You think of like, You know, again, like some ice sliding off your roof, like no big deal.
It’s like a little sheet of it, but that’s not really the case. It’s really like super dangerous to get like chucking bricks across my neighborhood. It’s like you’re under, under fire almost.
Thomas: Yeah, exactly. And you have to imagine that the tip of a, of a blade is like moving with more than 200 kilometers per hour.
So I don’t know, what’s thing miles per hour, but, uh, Pretty fast. And if the ice for off at the right moment or throws off at the Redmond, if it really goes far, right? So we’re talking regions about 100, 200, even 300 meters, and then maybe from a height of 200 meters, that, that there’s a lot of force behind it.
And you don’t want to get it on your car either.
Dan: Yeah, which I do want, I do want to see this in action though. So it might even have the video of it, of a turbine throwing a brick sized piece of ice. Please, please email it to me because that would be fascinating. You know, like as kids, you look at like, uh, Trevi, chaise, or.
Catapults and, you know, they have like that in the U S uh, I don’t know if you’re familiar with this Thomas, but in the U S they have a, what’s called the Punkin Chunkin contest. Are you ever aware of that? Every like Thanksgiving it’s, um, like these group of people get out in this huge field. I don’t know where they hold it at somewhere in the U S but.
There’s like a Canon division and like a trebuchet, like a catapult division. And then they like shoot these pumpkins, like into the stratosphere. So this was like, kind of reminds me of that, but some of these trebuchet, a trebuchet was that old, like medieval thing. They’re super cool. Um, Yeah, they’re throwing them like a mile.
And so it’s fascinating, but it reminds me of this a little bit, but, um, yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, okay. So depending on the, on the shape of the wind farm and for me, like sometimes I get in the mindset of like thinking of wind farms is just like a big, almost like a phalanx, you know, like a, an army formation where it’s just like a big rectangle, but they’re in practice.
They’re really not like that. Most of the time where they could be winding up on a mountain top, like there’s some in West Virginia, Couple of hours away that are just, you know, going on the mountaintop. And so the, the icing conditions, I could definitely see it there being like semi consistent from one to the next, but also potentially pretty different depending on like the sun that comes out that day, like where they’re positioned, maybe one gets a lot more sun or a lot less.
Um, so I guess, you know, like, like you said, a lot of the, uh, the operators have to really kind of figure out how much, like how diligent they want to be about it.
Thomas: At the end it’s it’s it’s most of the time, it’s the decision of the, the owner operator of the turbine. Um, and they, they normally can really, uh, they’re really good in touching if there is a risk.
Um, and on the other side, of course, men talking about this, this Texas event, of course, it, it might be also really interesting in that in a greater few or in a higher, like a top level view to, to think about that in terms of in grid operator. As already discussed to see early icing coming and like effecting several wind parks and maybe getting this hours of, of, uh, alert before and then turning on on maybe other plans or other termer plants.
To, uh, assist actually the power loss from, from winter events shutting off due to
Dan: icing. Yeah. And that’s what I think seems to make sense because that’s what it was so complicated with the Texas thing is that that storm was pretty rare. And obviously what happened was, you know, almost like a black Swan type of event, just, you know, maybe it could have been predicted, but.
Really, they just weren’t prepared for it. Right. Because it’s just so out of the blue. But then if you start to think, well, like, all right, Texas is pretty warm most of the time. Like how much do we really need to put there? Do we really need to spend all this money on all these different technologies? But the idea of, like you said, maybe you just have a couple of turbines equipped with sensors where you can say, okay, It looks like something might start to happen.
We don’t have to outfit all hundred of them and go to that expense, but we could put it on a couple. And now this gives us a little bit of alert. Like you said, let’s get the other types. Like in Texas, it was, you know, um, natural gas and some coal and, um, they can start to prepare for it. Now this is not a catastrophe catastrophe anymore.
I mean, is that something that maybe in like slightly warmer climates? That you would recommend or see people do is just like, just put these on a couple B rather than none. And that way you can sort of hedge your bets and have some, like you said, some of that predictive power it’s,
Thomas: it’s definitely the first thing you can do.
And it’s, it’s much, much cheaper than, uh, than like going for a heating solution or like a whole code climate package. Right? Like you said, for a region, which is normally really warm and, and. Didn’t have them so far. Even the acceptance will not be that high for another, like putting another, I don’t know what, what’s the price for heating solutions, retrofit heating solutions in all these turbines.
Uh, so the, the, the ice detection of several turbines and, and at least get the data of this whole area on, on certain points. I would say that that’s a good, good, cheap. A way for, for forecasting a little bit and, and avoiding such events.
Dan: Let’s talk a little bit about, uh, offshore versus onshore. I mean, are you seeing much of a difference obviously? One of the things I think that was really interesting that the, uh, last say at WiseTech mentioned was that as wind turbines get to a certain height, they’re actually reaching like into significantly colder parts of the atmosphere, uh, which I’ve found really like they can actually like kind of scrape into the clouds, grab some moisture and start to create ice that way, which is kind of like mind blowing.
Um, but with these getting bigger and bigger, I mean over 800 feet tall now, um, You know, and with off shore being such a rough environment, potentially, I mean, I mean, do you see something, I guess it’s like, two-part question. Do you see. Offshore versus versus on versus own shore being vastly different in their needs here, or, and do you see the height really starting to play a different, a new role in icing as we go forward?
Thomas: The height? Definitely for us detection. So we see that. Also as we have sensors, always on the tips that you can see icing, especially happening first at the tips, and then sometimes really that you don’t have anything Joseph to the root, uh, which, which also is sometimes it’s a, it’s, like I said, a cloud, like the plate really dipping into a cloud or, or, uh, most of the times it’s also the, the higher speed that accumulates and, and, um, uh, aerodynamic effects, having more eyes on the tip.
Offshore in terms of ice detection is I think a topic where safety is not that of a big concern, and it’s also seen a little bit different. So we have a crypt of shore turbines, but more of in terms of. Avoiding a service team going there. If there is some eyes on the naysayer on the tower. So because then they’re going get with a helicopter or with a boat and they are not allowed to enter the turbine because there are eyes and there might be the risk of falling ice down.
So they want to want to avoid costs for going there for nothing but not in terms of affording ice, because what happens if the ice forced down, it goes into the sea and yeah, nobody, nobody
Dan: cares. Yeah. Well, that’s an interesting, I didn’t think about that. So yeah. I mean, if they have to go manually start the turbine, that’s a big hassle and that’s a pretty expensive hassle, like you said, because even if they don’t go in there, um, That’s, you know, day’s worth of expense for multiple technicians.
Plus he said, like he said, charting a helicopter, like none of that’s cheap. So yeah. It’s interesting to think of all the different scenarios that start to play out and whether you should install X or Y kind of retrofit on your, or even at the factory for a turbine, just say like, yeah, we might have, you know, This many, you know, events over the course of the lifespan, where we have to send a technician out, they cost $10,000 a piece.
Therefore we should probably not do that. You know, it’s really interesting to think of all the, just the different scenarios that you have to prepare for as a wind farm operator. To just, like I said, just try to feel like what’s the, what’s the most savvy, intelligent, logical financial decision to make.
Should we spend X thousand dollars on this solution that will prevent these five scenarios that will probably happen, but may not happen? Um, like you said, that prediction is, is really, I think key as much as you can say, Hey, this is probably how many times. That this might happen. So I imagine with these bigger companies that own probably multiple sites, do you see them going more for like the data dashboard where they just want to start to understand the problem as a whole so that if there are, we’re going about to create our 30th wind farm, we’ve a pretty good understanding of icing from all these different sites that we’ve already had.
And now we can say, okay, based on where this is, it’s sort of similar to site access site, Y and now. Yes, lets go for a detection or yes, let’s go for detection and heating or no or whatever. Is that, is that something that the bigger companies tend to do?
Thomas: Definitely. So they all have their, as far as I know, they all have their own dashboards.
They have their engineers analyzing this data. Uh, doing comparison. Uh, I mean, there are always a big differences between the different OEMs to different manufacturers of turbines, the different ice detection solutions, uh, different sites, um, are the effects of icing. I mean, we talked about the safety things then in, I think that was close to, to the two Chicago talking about the orange park where icing is, is causing noise and this noise system.
Again, effect in the village goes by. So there are many reasons why, uh, operators and owners think about ice detection, especially the bigger companies doing a lot of. Of research, especially the last years in terms of, of, of this ice detection, what is necessary and what might
Dan: not be necessary. Yeah, that’s interesting.
Uh, one of the companies, uh, that we’re having on the show in the, in the near future is, is ping services and they have a. Um, uh, sound detection system that they Mount on the bottom of the, the tower, which can tell. And they said icing is one of their potential things as well, where they can tell when there’s changes to the blade, whether it’s damage or icing or something else.
Cause it changes the pitch and the sound of it, which is crazy to think about. Um, but yeah, I mean, these things are going so fast and they’re so big that yeah, you can imagine that just some little thing that’s off. Makes a really important change to the decibel level that it puts out, which could, which could also just say our, Hey, we have to stop our turbines because they’re too loud.
Now we didn’t account for that, which is also another, a big problem. Um, so w let’s talk a little bit about, um, automation and robotics, which is also a recurring theme, uh, on the show, just because it’s, it’s, that technology is taking off. Um, so you’re. Your sensors are stalled installed both as a factory install and a retrofit.
Um, what’s that ratio look like right now. And then do you see your installations being done by robots in the future? And if so, how far off is that? So in
Thomas: 2015, we started, uh, I would say with a hundred percent retrofit, of course, no manufacturers were, uh, Keen enough, I would say to start from the beginning with a new company and go, go on our new blades.
It’s not programmed to stick there. So we had to convince operators and owners. So we started with a hundred percent retrofit and, uh, in 2018, got into the, the option list of, of the first manufacturer last year, uh, the next manufacturer. So we at the moment that I would say 30%, 30 to 40% of manufacturing, uh, based installations.
And 60, uh, 60 to 70% still retrofitting turbines, retrofitting, retrofitting is happening, happening in, in rope access by a rope access or via platform. At the moment, they’re already talking with companies like arounds. I think they, they have been under the show already and, uh, they have great technology in VR to talk to them.
If it’s possible to install the sensors by their robots on the plates. It’s still a little bit tricky as, uh, we have, like I said, this erosion protection for and on the sensor and this one has to go on the blade without any wrinkles. So the process for a human is pretty easy. Like sticking a sticker on a window, just squeezing the liquid out and it’s flat and it’s fine.
But for a robot that’s that’s can still kind of difficult, but I would say in the near future, making the sensor a little bit smaller. Reducing this erosion protection filing, it will be possible to stick that also with a robot on the plate.
Dan: Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Were, you know, the contours of the blade, they continually change as they go towards the tip.
So the bigger your sensor is, the more it’s going to have to deal with. Some of those contours is that right? And the robot just has a tough time with that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, we, um, what was it? I, uh, I used to work in baseball, uh, and we were just trying to put, uh, stickers on them front of our batting helmets at the same thing.
It’s like, okay. We should be able to, we should have the technology to do this. We put like rockets into space and I can’t smooth a sticker on a batting helmet properly without getting wrinkled. I was very disappointed in myself.
Thomas: That’s the reason why the center has to be flexible, right? Because you can’t just take a stiff piece of a sensor and try to stick it on these different shapes all over the place.
It has to be flexible. It has to be. Uh, um, I fit there for, to, to any position of the plate as
Dan: far as like, uh, Robotics goes, do you see more of this like ecosystem evolving where, you know, robots deployed to do this or do that just in general? Not necessarily limited to Eologix, but um, I mean, you guys are a technology company, just like any other.
Um, and I’m sure you have to be on like the bleeding edge. So to say, um, you know, keeping up with what’s happening in technology and manufacturing, your own products to match, uh, increasingly automated world and robotic world. I mean, is that something that your company that you guys are really thinking about consistently?
Like how do we fit in, how do we manufacture our next versions or iterations to fit robotics demands, or to make an inspections easier on drone companies or et cetera, et cetera.
Thomas: So drones is definitely something that be, that is already used. I would not even say that it’s maybe the next thing that’s already happening.
So a lot of servicings and inspections are done by drones. It, there is always a great, great technology in AI for analyzing the blades. And that’s something we use already also for inspecting sensors that have been on blades for several years, how they are affected by erosion. If there are lightning strikes that didn’t go into the lightning receptors, how to the sensors, stuff like that, that’s much easier with drones and robots with this high, high technology camera, high resolution cameras on, on there.
Um, that’s something we definitely, uh, on tour or actually be already used. And then of course, robotics for installing the sensors. That’s that’s for, I would say also one of our next, next big things. If that can be realized, it’s also, um, really doing the things easier to get the sensors on the plates.
Because at the moment you need to have this real Bex escape. They have to stop the turbine. I mean, it’s, it’s nearly a day to install the whole system. That’s not a lot. But it also is of course better to do it in three hours, for example, right?
Dan: Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s, everyone’s goal is just moving faster and making it safer and getting people off the, off the blades themselves, because rope accesses, even though it’s, you know, the safety protocols are excellent.
It’s still just dangerous work. Right. It’s tough work. Um, so what’s next for you all. So I know you have another product you’re potentially rolling out soon. Um, can you tell me a little bit about that? Because it seems like when you have this sort of sensor platform that you could potentially do different things with it, right?
Thomas: That’s true. So we see the sensor definitely as a platform, as detection goes to the first thing, temperature measurement is on there and the next, next big thing. So to say for, for us, Uh, we’ll be in, in June, uh, launching, uh, pitch anger, misalignment detection. So we, we also have acceleration sensors on our sensor platform and giving us the possibility to, to detect and especially to continuously measure pitch misalignments and, uh, pitch angles.
During operation. And that’s the, the, the new thing doing this dispatch measurements continuously during a probation in or States of the operation. So not only at, for example, five meters per second, but also up to 20 meters per second.
Dan: So we’ve talked about y’all misalignment, uh, on past shows a little bit.
Um, but we haven’t talked really much about pitch angle misalignment. So can you just give me kind of an overview? I mean, to me it seems like, you know, the install, the blades one, so like why would they wander off, uh, out of misalignment,
Thomas: majority of things happen is actually due to service or to software updates of the turbines.
So really changing, thumping at the turbine over the lifetime. And then suddenly you have a. Like one blade going off with 0.5, maybe one degree, which is, which is really not a lot, but talking with one degree of misalignment of one blade, uh, you can expect an, a P losses of one to 3%. So that, and that’s again a lot.
And, and why that is happening is actually maybe the, the, the pitch study is changes or service teams. Um, Um, I leave some, some, some sensors and calibrated and so on. So there are actually many reasons why that can happen. And I also know now a lot of companies that started to after building turbines doing, uh, uh, pitch measurement, right after the commissioning as already, or at the commissioning phase of the, of the manufacturer.
Issues or, or, uh, failures can happen that reciting the pitch misalignment.
Dan: Okay. So once they update software or making some kind of change, that’s when they can get off. And like you said, one, one per one degree is so small where if you don’t notice, you just like leaking power for the
Thomas: indefinite future.
Additionally, you have audience stuff like individual pitch control. Automatic load control. So, uh, the modern turbine starts to change their pitch during one, one rotation. So there is a lot of pitch system doing their work there. Uh, Dell, they also can have failures. So maybe they’re not like one of these engines is not exactly, uh, operating correctly a hundred percent correctly.
And suddenly you have one degree off. Compared to the other page.
Dan: And then would this be, would this sensor be combined with ice detection or reviewed a separate sensor? Probably like different, you know, just like different customers. Obviously it could, it could be the same customer, but how, how do you, is it a combined thing or is the going to be separate?
Thomas: The center looks the same, uh, or though the eye sensor and, uh, the pitch sensor are two different things. So you have, especially in the positions of the. Sends us on their plate. They have to be different, but the receiver can be the same. So it is possible to have a kind of combined system, but you can also use each system, uh, on its own.
Dan: And you’re rolling those out the summer. Is that right?
Thomas: Exactly. So insurance, we have the, the, the official, uh, launch and yeah. Starting with, with August, they will be able to be in stored on, on, or the blades of our cases.
Dan: That’s awesome. Well, I’m sure you guys are excited about that new product launch and, you know, so much goes into the development of all that stuff.
So it’s always like a nice milestone from sure. For your team to see it finally get out the door and start to get on, um, you know, on those, uh, those turbines.
Thomas: Yes. So we already were excited as it was also really long way to go for this new, new product. Um, but I think we did a great job and yeah, maybe you have really, really good research from, from two rounds of sort of prototype installation.
So we had eight, eight turbines last year. Uh, we have another four turbines beginning of this year, equipped with, with systems and yeah, every single is really promising. So. Really being really excited.
Dan: And your, and your ice sensor is certified by DNV. Um, is that something that, uh, do they certify, like pitch, pitch alignment?
Is that something that you guys be seeking when this rolls out or will it roll out with certification already
Thomas: been rolled out fish education? And then, I mean, it’s not that important from our perspective as if the ice detection is with face detection, it’s a safety thing. And you have to prove that it works because it’s it’s safety, right.
For the pitch anger, uh, misalignment detection. It’s more like a cert company. Validating that, that it’s true. What, what, what we tell we can do so that the third company is, is validating our sensor.
Dan: Well, that makes sense. I’m gonna get, uh, a couple, um, DNV N uh, at the time, I think it was still called DNV GL engineers, uh, Alex Byrne and Matt Mulkin and I mean, brilliant people.
So when you know a company like that, so validating your tech. I mean, I think that’s always a, you know, let’s people adopt it quicker without less, with less worry, you know, because they know this thing has been checked. By some of the best in the industry. So
Thomas: that was the idea behind it. Exactly.
Dan: Yeah. So, Thomas, uh, we really appreciate your time today.
Um, how can people follow up with Eologix and keep, uh, keep pace with what you’re doing?
Thomas: So it would be great to follow us on LinkedIn. So we order or the great news, the launch of the new product case studies. Um, we have everything on LinkedIn, of course, or it’s on our webpage. Um, that would be great.
We always have there a very interesting by paper. If we want to get to know much more about ice detection, it’s, it’s, everything is explained in there. The same thing will be for the launch for the pitch event. Um, so it would be great to, to have a look at the webpage and then maybe follow us on
Dan: LinkedIn.
Okay. So for those of you listening or watching here on YouTube, as always, we’ll put links to Eologix and their LinkedIn page and all the social places, you can follow them in the description below. Again, whether you’re on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or YouTube, wherever, um, you can easily click through and follow up with them.
So, Thomas, thanks so much for being on the show. I really appreciate, it was a really interesting conversation. And like I said, another angle to this, a whole wind turbine blade icing, you know, kind of. Issue that we’ve been talking through. Thanks a lot for the invitation. All right. Well, we’re wrap up today’s episode of uptime.
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