Wind is picking up; green ships are on the rise

Wind power is back in many ways. The financial crisis has changed the competitive landscape for good. The number of turbine manufacturers and supply chain players has shriveled. This is due to consolidation as well as many stepping out of the wind space, which means that supply and demand are back in better balance.

First, the roles in the industry have evolved to embrace an approach characterized by networking. Turbine suppliers have found their core business and are more open to share the work with competent partners. Even people have changed. New people have filled practically all top positions, giving a new look to the industry. Better still, vertical integration has now been abandoned. The industry has taken step toward maturity. It is very important that turbine manufacturers start to earn money. Wind power is at last interesting for investors, as it is the best, future-proof way to build new electricity production.

Second, technology has improved. The most obvious change has been in longer blades and taller towers, but improvements have also been made under the hood. Full-power converters have taken their rightful place as the most common solution in new turbine designs. The long battle of enhancing and tweaking double-fed converters and reactive power systems at wind parks has come to an end. The superior power quality and network support features inherent to full-power converters are bringing turbine performance to the level of conventional power plants. This is key as the penetration of distributed power production has started to increase.

Permanent magnet (PM) generators that have occupied medium-speed turbine development are now being applied also to direct-drive and high-speed applications, especially in China. And the remote monitoring and preventive maintenance concepts are making their way to wind parks, as operators want to gain a deeper understanding of the performance of their assets.

Third, offshore is now recognized as a very different business than the onshore business, and project business must be streamlined before any full deployment can start. In any case, offshore is in the plans for many countries in Europe, along with China, US and India. The event in Copenhagen has been a good forum to take the business further.

The Switch is also advancing well in the marine industry by offering similar innovative drive train concepts as for wind power. I see clear parallels in the wind and marine businesses. The marine industry has been distressed, mainly because of the heavy hit by the financial crisis and sudden drop in oil prices. As a result, interest in more advanced drive trains to build future-proof, green ships is on the rise.

The Switch intends to be a leading partner in this next phase of the wind and marine industry. We have a solid track record thanks to our deliveries that now exceeding 12,000 MW. Our new owner Yaskawa shares our passion to be a major player in the wind and marine space. This gives The Switch a solid foundation and backing on our quest toward being an active member in these industries with our out-of-the-box solutions and agile way of working that have already inspired so many customers, partners – and even our competition.

Looking forward to further co-juvenation within the industry,

J-P