Many people agree that the future of green energy relies on renewable sources like solar and wind, but these sources have a ways to go before they catch up to the ubiquity of fossil fuels. Sure, the positive environmental impacts should be a reason in itself to switch over to renewables, but we’ll have to see innovations across the green energy industry to make renewables more enticing economically.
Burlington, Massachusetts-based startup WindESCo is doing just that for wind plants, and on Wednesday the company announced that it closed $10 million in Series B funding.
WindESCo has built technology that helps wind plants optimize their production and profits. The company’s WE Boost platform uses SCADA data to find opportunities to increase revenue without increasing expenses. Meanwhile, its WE Protect solution maps wind conditions and measures component status to protect against equipment failure.
“WindESCo’s solutions fill a major gap in the wind energy performance optimization space. We have successfully applied our solutions to increasing the operating margins of wind plants for project owners,” the company’s CEO and founder Mo Dua said in a statement. “WAVE and Tenaska’s investment validates our approach. The funds will allow WindESCo to expand our product offerings and further our customer-centric focus.”
Wind plants in eight countries across three continents use WindESCo’s technology. As a result, they are able to increase revenue by between 1 and 7 percent. When operating a plant as large and expensive as a wind farm, every percent increase counts.
This new funding will help WindESCo further develop the technology it offers. The company also plans to expand its sales and customer success teams, as well as form new partnerships.
