Founder of failed Windflow Technology still sees opportunity for wind power

Tuesday, 24 December 2019

Windflow provided the turbines for Te Rere Hau's 97-turbine wind farm near Palmerston North.

The founder of wind turbine company Windflow Technology says the collapse of his company has been 'very difficult' personally, but he still has high hopes its intellectual property will find a home.

Windflow went into voluntary liquidation last Wednesday after shareholders decided the 19-year-old company had run out of options.

Geoff Henderson of Windflow Technology in 2008. The company was his baby but he is still hopeful its technology will live on.

However, Christchurch-based former chief executive, founder and current director Geoff Henderson said there was still life at the core of the company's product, its double-bladed turbine.

The company's managed collapse had been hard, 'as you could imagine'. But all creditors were expected to get paid, as a solvent liquidation.

**READ MORE:

Hau Nui Wind Farm, established in 1996 by Genesis Energy, was New Zealand's first wind farm.

* Windflow Technology calls it a day

* Second stage of New Zealand's biggest wind farm to go ahead

* Windflow down to 4.8 employees - minus founder Henderson**

Henderson, a mechanical engineer who has worked in the US and Britain, exited as Windflow's chief executive in 2017 to gain some more free time, though he remained a director.

He intends to stay on with the company assisting the liquidators.

Several windfarms are based in the Manawatu, including Mercury NZ's 60 turbine Turitea wind farm, which will produce enough energy to power 118,000 average homes.

'The technology's been successful, that's the important point, and I'm very proud of what we've achieved technically,' he said.

'My focus now is very much on trying to see the IP and to the best party who can take the technology forward. It won't necessarily be international. I think there are prospects in New Zealand that would be good as well.'

The company began with much promise in 2000, with the blessing of then Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons who was a shareholder to the end.

It raised enough equity to build its first 500kW turbine near Christchurch in 2003. Later it supplied a 97-turbine wind farm near Palmerston North, NZ Windfarm's Te Rere Hau.

Henderson holds patents for a system he calls the Torque Limiting Gearbox system. He helped found the NZ Wind Energy Association, and in 2008 he was named Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year.

As Te Rere Hau neared completion, the company began looking for other markets. The most attractive was not the US where subsidies were politically driven, but the UK where incentives were being offered for medium-sized turbines.

Windflow had a 24-turbine deal lined up when a change in government policy left the UK wind industry up in the air for 18 months, which 'just about killed our resolve'.

However, in 2013 the company started building the first of eight turbines in the UK. It ended up owning six, putting its technology to the test in some of the windiest parts of Scotland.

'It would have been a nice little business, and then towards the end of 2013 the power companies said, No we can't take any more wind turbines on the system and announced a moratorium, which has never been lifted,' Henderson said.

Windflow's UK business was eventually sold to the company's long-term international backer in return for an earlier loan.

The investor's decision this year to sell the UK business ended Windflow's UK maintenance contract, forcing shareholders to make a difficult decision.

However, Henderson still hopes someone will pick up the technology, particularly Windflow's 'synchronous power train;' in other words, its ability to provide a stable energy flow to the grid.

Synchronicity was important for avoiding blackouts, Henderson said. Wind fluctuated, so most turbines dealt with it by letting the generator speed vary, but it could get out of sync with the other generators in the system.

'If you want to maintain voltage and frequency stability of the power grid, the world is either going to have to find synchronous wind turbines like ours, or it's going to have to provide the attributes of synchronous generators some other way.

'My view is that all those other ways are much more expensive and at this stage, totally unproven, whereas the synchronous generator is fully proven and trusted by power system operators.'

Even in a country like New Zealand, where hydro-power was such a big player, Henderson said wind still had its place. There were drier months and wind was more predictable than rain, at least on a monthly basis.

Solar energy has had a high profile in recent years, but wind was more predictable on a monthly basis, Henderson said.

Solar energy – which has arguably stolen much of wind's thunder – was more predictable day to day.

After the liquidation, the company received a plaudit from Europe's Solar Impulse Foundation, which acknowledges it as one of 1000 solutions for a sustainable future.

'It's a bit ironic two days after a special shareholders meeting to put the company in liquidation,' Henderson noted, but it was nice to get the international recognition.

He said New Zealand had one of the only unsubsidised wind industries in the world, and its climate change policies to date had been less than steady.

However, some bigger turbines were now being built.

Those who didn't like the sight of turbines might be surprised, he noted.

'Mid-sized turbines have much less visual impact per unit of output and so I think that's an important factor and will become increasingly important as more and more windfarms go in. So I'd like to think the technology carry on.'