Energy
Oil & gas will not run out for a while yet, but their extraction is an escalating cost item and an increasing threat to the environment and climate. Furthermore, political and also geological risks are associated with it. The market share of alternative energy sources is therefore steadily increasing, from wind and solar energy to hydro power, biomass and that ‘old chestnut’ nuclear energy. The further development of these technologies takes a lot of innovation focused on reliable and affordable energy generation.
In our modern society, continuity – in addition to safety – is paramount in energy supply. Energy systems, from converters in solar installations to generators for windmills and turbines in hydro power plants, must therefore be equipped with robust components. Critical subsystems, such as in the control unit, should be provided on a redundancy basis. This should prevent unplanned downtime for corrective maintenance as much as possible.
However, planned downtime, for preventive or even predictive maintenance, should also be limited in the extreme – naturally because of the unwelcome interruption of the energy supply, but also due to the cost and complex organisation of maintenance; think of windmills at sea or nuclear power plants. In addition to quality assurance, standardisation of components and streamlined servicing and logistics can contribute to continuity, both operationally and financially.
With all of these things, the builders and users of energy systems have a lot of different aspects to consider. A party who can advise on this in detail is the technical value-added distributor, who, for example, also has knowledge of safety regulations and maintenance methodologies such as condition monitoring. For innovation, this partner also has a broad spectrum of technology at his disposal. On top of that, he can deliver the mechanical and electrotechnical supplies, in all their diversity, and deploy smart logistic concepts for them. This is how the technical value-added distributor provides a sunny perspective to this sector.