The power to deliver

By Gregory Crew, Product Manager

Power Climber Wind maximizes productivity of wind generating assets by providing operations and maintenance support – an important but perhaps undervalued aspect of the drive to make the most of this abundant resource.

The wind energy industry installed nearly 20 GW in new capacity in 2007, representing a nearly $40bn global industry. New capacity additions will exceed 25 GW this year, with that number expected to nearly double over the next ten years. Driving this growth is investment by the world’s leading utilities and energy companies, including Iberdrola, EdF, E.On, Vattenfall, BP, and others as they strive to diversify their portfolios, respond to public policy and address climate concerns. This growth has been a boon to ailing industrial sectors in Europe and North America, but especially to the local rural economies where wind projects are located. Among the wider range of economic impacts generated by the wind industry, various studies have shown that every 100 MW installed creates, after construction, 5-10 longterm plant jobs and twice as many non-plant jobs.

These “green collar” jobs include trained turbine technicians, utility and transmission services, and various subcontractors to ensure the ongoing operation and maintenance (O&M) of the utility- scale wind plants that represent the industry’s future. Work includes performing inspection, preventative maintenance and repair on internals, blades, hubs, and towers of today’s turbines. Turbine availability and energy output is fundamentally linked to technicians working safely and productively at elevation.

Wind plant O&M service providers face growing challenges as turbines have grown larger in recent years, now reaching up to 160m tall: these include increased employee attrition, mounting employee healthcare costs associated with repetitive manual climbing fatigue, and the need for expensive external cranes for certain maintenance operations.

Turbine technicians receive over 200 hours of training, and cost up to $20,000 to replace when all hiring, training and contingency costs are tallied. Annual technician attrition ranges from 25 percent to 33 percent industry-wide, with certain locales approaching 50 percent. Take the case of the US, where projections call for over 15,000 turbine technicians by 2020. Replacement costs alone could reach $70m at current attrition rates.

Maximising profitability
The mission of Power Climber Wind is to help manage O&M costs and maximize profitability of wind assets. By providing a range of powered access solutions for work processes both inside and outside wind turbines for more than 10 years, Power Climber Wind helps improve safety and productivity of wind turbine maintenance personnel.

This leads to:
• Increased asset productivity and availability
• Lower attrition
• Lower health costs, fewer climbing and fatigue related injuries
• Reduced exposure to falls or stoppages
• Replacement of expensive external cranes for many operations with safe, efficient, cost-effective platforms

Power Climber Wind’s parent company SafeWorks has been in the business of providing reliable, innovative powered access equipment and services to the oil and gas, traditional energy, waterworks, bridge and transport and related infrastructure markets for more than 60 years. Advocating for worker protections within regulatory bodies over the years, and incorporating voluntary safety measures decades before regulations mandated them, the company’s leadership position is well respected. Under its Spider brand, the company owns and operates 24 depots dedicated solely to suspended access – the largest equipment fleet and service network in North America. Its professional fleet ownership entails rigorous review of operating metrics that proves the company’s case that its product solutions offer the lowest total cost of ownership.

Further, learning from firsthand “voice of operator” influences, technology investments in more durable components, increased operating time between maintenance intervals, faster spares replacements, better product modularity and alternative protective packaging – all drive improved reliability.

Increasing productivity
Fundamentally, equipment that is more reliable keeps technicians working which means more blades are producing energy. Power Climber Wind is committed to sustainable wind farm investments that protect worker safety and provide the return on investment farm owners expect. The company’s collective experience in emerging sectors such as telecommunications, commercial shipping, military infrastructure and oil and gas development demonstrates its understanding of the demands on facility owners and contractors.

Today’s urgency to bring alternative energy to market, competitively and safely for the men and women employed in the sector, demands trusted product and service solutions – and experience market-leading Power Climber Wind delivers.