Innovation Manager Mike Newman on secondment at Fraunhofer IWES.
To start this week off, I visited the Fraunhofer IWES institute for energy system technology, in Kassel. I met more of the Fraunhofer IWES team from the south and had a great introduction to activities down there. With a pre-existing relationship between our SPARTA team and the Fraunhofer IWES team operating WInD-Pool, discussions about O&M R&D projects flowed as smoothly as the coffee. Next steps for this partnership will be very interesting, so watch this space.
Talking of space, I also had a fleeting adventure back to London to join the Wind Power Monthly conference “Developing and Operating Further Offshore Wind Farms,” along with my colleague from Fraunhofer IWES, Marcel Wiggert. The topic of my presentation was “Solving Project Development And O&M Issues Using Satellite Technology” and provided an overview of the work we are doing with our colleagues in the Satellite Applications Catapult. If you are interested, please come along to our launch event for the European Space Agency Ambassador platform, in Glasgow on 18th November. You can find out more about R&D funding for offshore energy projects that include the use of satellite technology.
Here ends my journey but I think this is only the beginning of a long partnership. The topic of the trip has definitely been open collaboration, which is key for our institutions and for our industry more widely. For IWES and ORE Catapult, the sum is often greater than the two parts and there are some clear areas for collaboration that we have begun working together on. Thank you to all of the Fraunhofer IWES team in both Kassel and Bremerhaven for making me feel at home!