The Statement of the renowned Swiss «Green Business Award» is clear: «If we want to preserve our planet for future generations, business must be part of the solution! ». We couldn’t agree more and are thrilled to announce that Sulzer Schmid and our 3DX Blade Platform is now officially nominated for this year’s «Green Business Award».

Wind power is a low-carbon energy source and when a wind turbine generates electricity there are no CO2 emissions. However, badly maintained blades, erosion and defects can develop to a level where 4-6% annual energy production can be lost from the yield of a wind turbine compared to its theoretical power curve. This can advance to over 9% where the coating of the blade’s leading edge has eroded, leaving turbines operating far below their potential[1].

Regular inspections and maintenance are key to improve the performance of wind turbines, but traditional inspection methods are costly, non-repeatable, dangerous, and very time consuming.

Our fully digital, end-to-end drone-based inspection process uses autonomous drones on pre-defined flight paths and reduces inspection times by up to 90% or as much as 7 hours per inspection. No matter which method is chosen, the turbine must be stopped during inspection and by reducing the downtime we consequently increase the use of wind energy.

To summarize, our 3DX Blade Platform helps making wind energy more competitive and contributes to the reduction of CO2 emissions in more ways than one:

● By reducing the downtime of wind turbines, we contribute to increased energy production

● By increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of O&M we help optimize the performance

● By providing insights into the health status of the blades we help our customers lowering the cost of energy production through better planned repairs and maintenance work

By means of digitalization and smart robotics, we can make wind as an energy source more cost efficient. Read more about how we contribute to meeting the world’s climate targets by checking out our profile on the Green Business Award: https://greenbusinessaward.ch/nominierte/3dx-blade-platform/.

[1] Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy and Energy System Technology: Energies 2017, 10, 1420: “The Influence of Eroded Blades on Wind Turbine Performance Using Numerical Simulations” mdpi.com/journal/energies