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RWE Renewables – Optimization of wind farms performance
ConnectPoint and RWE cooperate on the field of digitalization of RWE wind farms. In this project ConnectPoint collaborated on an application for simulating impact of different maintenance strategies on key production and financial indicators. Simulations are executed over a requested time horizon for given configuration of assets, maintenance activities and resources (manpower, materials, vehicles, facilities). They take into account unpredictability of weather, maintenance events and workload in time and deliver estimates of asset availability, energy production, revenues and costs. The application can be used by RWE to support decision-making on maintenance strategies for operational projects and to provide more accurate costs assumptions for projects in development.
The challenge
A key factor in managing large-scale renewable energy assets is minimizing downtime. Any interruption in the operation of a wind turbine or photovoltaic inverter leads to revenue loss. At the same time, maintenance requires resources such as service teams, warehouses, spare parts and vehicles, all of which generate costs. Selecting the optimal number and distribution of these resources, estimating their costs and assessing revenue losses caused by device unavailability is a complex task.
Major challenges include:
- the unpredictability of maintenance events,
- fluctuating service team workloads,
- weather-dependent repair conditions
- and volatile energy prices.
Too few technicians may extend downtime when multiple failures occur, while too many standby resources can create unnecessary costs. The goal of the ongoing project is to develop a tool for comparing multiple maintenance strategies across any number of renewable assets, helping identify the most cost-effective solution.
Solution
ConnectPoint and RWE built an Azure‑based tool that simulates maintenance strategies for wind and solar farms and shows their impact on production and financial KPIs. Users define strategies, run scenarios, and compare results through interactive charts and tables. The cloud solution ensures secure data storage, controlled data location, and access only for authorized internal users. Azure’s scalable computing lets RWE run many simulations efficiently and cost‑effectively. The browser application significantly reduces analysis time and supports data‑driven optimization of asset operations. ConnectPoint continues helping RWE integrate data‑science methods into commercial decision‑making.
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