UpWind Sentinel, a recently launched drive train health monitoring solution has been chosen by CIRI for their GE 1.6 MW turbines at the Fire Island Wind Farm in Alaska based on its cutting edge technology, user friendly interface, and overall value.
UpWind Solutions, Inc., the wind industry’s most comprehensive operations and maintenance (O&M) independent service provider, announced they have signed an agreement to provide their recently launched drive train health monitoring solution called UpWind Sentinel at the Fire Island Wind Farm in Alaska. The wind farm is owned and operated by Fire Island Wind LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cook Inlet Region Inc. (CIRI).
UpWind Sentinel is one of the latest performance engineering tools from UpWind that was built by operators for operators. CIRI selected UpWind Sentinel as their solution because of the user friendly software interface designed for operators as well as the MEMS sensor technology that can be calibrated remotely online, removing the need for costly uptower calibration.
CIRI has been pleased with UpWind’s operations and maintenance performance on Fire Island and their partnership has continued to grow by choosing UpWind Sentinel for the drive train monitoring solution. Installing UpWind Sentinel now will help avoid unscheduled maintenance and costly component failures on the island. In the electric power industry, detailed case studies and an associated “Plant Maintenance Cost Justification” have been conducted in the US by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), and these show that predictive maintenance can reduce expenses by 47% compared to unscheduled or reactive maintenance.
For example, UpWind Sentinel can identify damaged high speed gearbox bearings and alert CIRI that scheduled bearing replacements are required to prevent a catastrophic failure and loss of production. The OpEx savings of preventing even one gearbox failure will show a return on their investment in a drive train health monitoring solution.
UpWind Solutions
www.upwindsolutions.com
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