2019 PBN Innovative Companies: Energy
Aquanis Inc.
EAST GREENWICH-BASED Aquanis Inc. is a wind-energy startup with ideas to make this power sector more palatable in terms of cost, which is a barrier to its growth.
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Founder and CEO Neal E. Fine said that wind energy represents immense opportunity. “If we put wind turbines on the two U.S. coasts, they’d supply twice our national power needs. It’s too costly now. We’re trying to use technology to reduce that cost,” he said.
Aquanis – which includes Chief Technology Officer John A. Cooney and Senior Mechanical Engineer Chris Szlatenyi – has two innovations in early research and development.
The first would make wind turbines better at withstanding things such as wind shear with load-control systems on their blades. Where the innovation has a larger impact, it also requires more work: the path to commercialization involves manufacturers introducing new components into their turbine-building processes.
“The trends have been to grow these turbines larger” to address aerodynamic issues, Fine said. “The industry has stalled as they can’t grow any larger. The answer is clear: smarter blades that react to changes in the wind.”
Aquanis is negotiating with a manufacturer. He said the load-control system would meet a potential global market of more than $1 billion a year.
Aquanis’ other innovation targets a potential global market of about $50 million annually: A blade coating that will help protect wind turbines against lightning strikes, boosting the electricity field and promoting flashover. Lightning energy would repel down the turbine blade and won’t cause puncture damage, for which repairs require costly downtime, Fine said.
In July, Aquanis received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop the lightning-damage mitigation blade coating.
Aquanis envisions having both innovations on every wind-energy turbine in the next decade.
“We believe in leaving the Earth habitable for our descendants,” said Fine. “Wind energy and solar energy are good contributors to that.”
