Advancements are being made in renewable energy all the time as companies look to meet an increasing demand for electricity without increasing the impact on the environment. One area in particular that is seeing progress is wind energy.
A report by an energy think tank shows that renewables like solar and wind generated more electricity than coal globally for the first time ever. From scouting locations to designing turbines, there are many opportunities for data and analytics to have an impact on wind energy. Here are some examples of how data is being used for wind farms, and how it can make a difference elsewhere in the utilities industry.
What is a wind farm?
Wind farms use turbines to produce electricity from wind energy. They can be located on land or at sea. Vineyard Wind is currently building the nation’s first utility-scale offshore wind energy project. It is located 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, MA, and will consist of 62 wind turbines, each capable of generating 13 megawatts of electricity. The electricity generated by the turbines will be collected by an offshore substation before being transmitted to shore.
The Vineyard Wind project is expected to offer $3.7 billion in energy-related cost savings over the life of the project, eliminating 1.6 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year, and reliably producing the amount of energy used by more than 400,000 homes in Massachusetts.
What kind of data comes from wind turbines?
The data around wind farms is about more than just the electricity being generated. Part of the development of the Vineyard Wind project involved careful planning about where to place the turbines and where to put the wires under the sea floor with minimal impact on marine life. The area was picked because of its powerful and reliable wind speeds, and the fact that the conditions support wind turbines, which was determined after years of data collection. During construction, the placement of weather buoys helps collect weather data throughout the building process.
Envision Energy has spent years developing a two-blade onshore turbine prototype, a cost-effective alternative to conventional three-blade models. The success of its latest prototype is based on its ability to meet critical performance metrics including stability and availability. Smart features on wind turbines can help provide real-time updates if there are failures or if repairs are needed, allowing for immediate intervention, as well as easier inspection of potentially hard-to-reach areas.
What impact can analytics have on the utilities industry?
In the utilities industry, every data point matters. There are the financial aspects that impact a utility business, like infrastructure upkeep. There are the regulatory and ethical aspects such as how to generate the most electricity without negatively impacting the environment. And there is also the need to provide an essential service to customers at a reasonable price. In order to find success in all of these areas, organizations need a flexible analytics solution that can meet all of the industry’s complex challenges, such as Dimensional Insight’s Diver Platform.
Just as energy companies look at certain metrics when assessing such factors as the size and design of a wind turbine, they also need a solution that can manage KPIs that are critical to their business operation. Real-time visibility keeps everyone informed, and data integrity and clear visualization of that data allows for confident decision-making. A scalable solution allows an organization to adjust if necessary, which is important for an industry where advancements are constantly being made to both the production and delivery of energy.
The future of the utilities industry is exciting, whether that is as a company finding solutions to the demands of customers, or as customers who may be witnessing the rise of wind turbines on the horizon. In order for organizations to keep pace with the growth the industry is seeing, they need an analytics solution that will help them make sense of the data available to them. With every advancement comes more data. The organizations that are ready to handle it are the ones that are best suited to move forward in an expanding industry.
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