It is also a major worldwide wind operations and maintenance (O&M) provider, both for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and in its own right. Here sales manager Luis Moreno considers O&M purchasing strategies.

Interview by Jason Deign

Q: What is Ingeteam’s experience in wind farm O&M?

A: We work across Europe, the US, Mexico, Panama, Brazil and Chile, and are starting up in South Africa and Australia. As a group, we are also present in India and China. We started working with turbines 15 years ago, doing after-sales service.

Since then we have developed our offering to fit whatever the customer is looking for. We can deliver services on behalf of an OEM or work directly as an independent service provider [ISP] for the wind farm owner. In the latter case, we can offer something like a full warranty.

Q: How much of your work is on behalf of OEMs?

A: Overall our business is about 60:40 in favour of work on behalf of OEMs, but it is moving to 50:50. We are responsible for around 2,500 turbines, either as first-line or second-line support, and about 60% of our business is in Spain.

Q: Can any wind farm owner use an ISP for O&M?

A: It all depends on the asset owner’s maintenance strategy, and may also be affected by some constraints linked to the OEM. Some OEMs are open-minded about allowing the asset owner to take control over the O&M activities, directly or through an ISP, while others are not so flexible.

Q: What are the differences between mature and emerging markets when it comes to O&M?

A: What we find is that increasingly in mature markets we work directly for plant owners, while in emerging markets we work on behalf of the manufacturer.

In emerging markets the manufacturers offer long-term maintenance contracts whereas in mature markets there is something of a battle for maintenance. OEMs realise this could be a revenue stream and are trying to claw it back.

Q: How is the role of the ISP changing over time?

A: Historically, ISPs just provided manpower. But at Ingeteam we have started to specialise in different O&M areas, such as spare parts supply or blade services. We can now do turnkey projects.

Q: What can plant owners do to reduce their O&M costs?

A: It is clear that operational expenditure is now a hot topic. In the last five years the cost of maintenance has dropped by about 30%. We’ve come from a time when efficiency wasn’t the main theme, because new installations were the focus.

All players are currently analysing internal processes to improve as much as possible, keeping the performance at equal service levels.

We are seeing some ideas being implemented to reduce the cost: longer-term contracts to better provision projects, non-permanent teams on site and so on.

At Ingeteam Service, we are focused not just on reducing the costs but also on improving the energy efficiency of the wind farms.

We have developed condition monitoring systems to reinforce predictive maintenance, computerized maintenance management system solutions to get the most from the wind turbine data analysis, and research and development projects to keep ahead of new techniques.