Protecting Our Grid Lines

Affordable Wire Management (AWM), a leading provider of utility-scale Cable Management Systems (CMS), announced the company’s new offering at ACP’s CLEANPOWER 2025 conference: Strata. Strata is engineered for today’s market-leading Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS), delivering a clean, scalable pathway for managing power and control cables. AWM’s Strata for Fluence Gridstack Pro, Tesla Megapack, Sungrow PowerTitan 2.0, Powin Pod, EPC Power M System, Nidec Conversion Battery Energy Storage Solutions, SolBank 3.0 and LG Energy Storage Systems (ESS) offers a tailored fit for modern energy infrastructure.

Field-adjustable, durable and adaptable, AWM’s Strata offerings are compatible with a range of foundation types. Far more robust compared to others on the market, Strata reduces steel costs and install times compared to alternatives. The above-ground solution reduces or eliminates trenching altogether. As with all ofAWM’s solutions, Strata is backed by AWM’s professional support team, known for their unparalleled engineering and field expertise. 

"We worked closely with our customers to understand how BESS project requirements are evolving—and saw that existing solutions weren’t keeping up with the scale, complexity, and pace of deployment in today’s market,” commented Peter Hruby Chief Product Officer of Affordable Wire Management.  “Strata reflects our commitment to building products that not only solve immediate challenges in the field, but also help drive long-term value and accelerate the transition to clean, flexible energy systems."

The Strata suite of offerings includes:

Strata Pack – Engineered for Tesla Megapack

AWM’s Strata Pack is a raceway and cleating system that simplifies cable routing from Tesla Megapacks to the transformer, reducing installation time and improving reliability. AWM’s proven cleat and support system securely routes and protects cables, minimizing the risk of damage and enabling power plant longevity and energy yield.

Strata Cleat – Designed for all other BESS Layouts 

Engineered for durability, ease of installation, and long-term performance, Strata Cleat minimizes components, simplifies and speeds up construction for EPCs, and assures reliability for stand-alone storage or hybrid renewables power plants.  

Strata MV Highway – Built for all BESS Platforms 

The Strata MV Highway is ideal for all utility-scale BESS, especially where underground work is cost-prohibitive or restricted. This above-ground offering provides a safe, efficient, and trench-free ‘highway’ for routing MV (medium voltage) cables from the BESS yard to the substation. Designed with a modular rail and cradle system, it ensures proper cable support over long distances while minimizing site disruptions and reducing installation time. 

Naveed Hasan, Vice President of Strategy for Sungrow North America remarked, “AWM has consistently delivered value-engineered solutions that keep pace with the requirements of today’s modern grid-scale power plants. We’re pleased to see the team has continued its legacy of innovation, with offerings that support Sungrow’s PowerTitan, our intelligent liquid-cooled energy storage system.”

A Commitment to Industry Standards

The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) sets the standards for securing cables in electrical installations, ensuring cable cleats provide proper retention, support, and resistance to electro-mechanical forces. Engineered to meet these safety and reliability standards, AWM’s cleats are rated to IEC 61914, the industry’s most rigorous specifications for cable cleats used in electrical installations. Subpar or under-specified BESS cable management components pose serious fault risks.

Dan Smith, CTO and Co-founder of AWM, explained: “Many competitors are cutting corners by ignoring IEC 61914 standards, offering cable management solutions that put power plant longevity and O+M workers’ safety at risk. Fault conditions can occur at any time, and consequences can be severe. At AWM, we take a different approach—our bonded, all-metal offerings are designed for long-term reliability, ensuring safe and predictable operations. Simply put, we refuse to compromise on safety and performance.”

AWM | www.affordablewm.com/BESS

Orange EV, the leading U.S. manufacturer of pure-electric yard trucks, announced that multiple customers each own and operate more than 100 Orange EV trucks at sites across the United States and Canada. These fleets made the switch from diesel to Orange EV electric for many reasons including operational challenges and expense from diesel breakdowns, diesel fuel management costs, health and safety risks, driver fatigue, and costly downtime.

Orange EV - e-TRIEVER

"For too long, diesel has been the default, and fleets have tolerated the many drawbacks inherent to diesel yard trucks including work interruptions and downtime due to emission control systems that were not designed for low-speed operations, time-consuming fueling trips, and frequent and slow repairs," said Zack Ruderman, Orange EV VP of Sales & Marketing. "These aren't just frustrating, they're expensive. Our trucks and service eliminate these issues and deliver what diesel can't: superior reliability, significant lifetime savings, and peace of mind. Orange EV trucks are better than their diesel counterparts in every way. The fact that they are also zero-emission is icing on the cake."

Diesel pain points cited by customers include:

• High and fluctuating diesel prices: Electricity is more cost-effective and predictable which helps fleets reduce and stabilize expenses.
• Frequent and unpredictable interruptions for diesel repair and maintenance: Orange EV trucks are engineered for reliability with e-TRIEVER® trucks averaging more than 98% uptime.
• Expensive diesel repair and maintenance: Orange EV trucks are backed by an industry-leading standard warranty that includes a 7.5-year battery warranty. An optional e-TRIEVER extended warranty also covers motors, controllers, harnesses, and more for 7.5 years / 30,000 hours, including parts and labor when serviced by Orange EV.
• High driver turnover: Orange EV trucks are built for comfort and performance, eliminating the noise, vibration, and fumes that lead to diesel yard truck drivers' fatigue and safety issues. Drivers overwhelmingly prefer the smoother, cooler, quieter, and cleaner Orange EV trucks.

Customers share that the higher upfront investment of electric can initially be a barrier to entry, but lower operating costs have proven to deliver strong returns, advancing the expansion of their electric fleets. Fuel, maintenance, and repair costs drive these savings. In one of the above-referenced fleets, two of their 100+ Orange EV trucks each have more than 30,000 hours of operation. For just those two trucks, they have saved - to date - an estimated $395,000 in fuel costs alone.

Orange EV leads the industry with more than 1,400 heavy-duty electric yard trucks deployed with 8.5 million hours of operation across 40 states and Canada. The company's 300+ customers - many with dozens if not hundreds of Orange EV trucks deployed into daily operations - are saving with Orange EV's turnkey solution that include trucks, charging, and a dedicated service support team, all built and backed in the United States and supported across both the U.S. and Canada.

Orange EV | https://orangeev.com

As energy storage manufacturing scales rapidly, it’s critical to maintain quality and safety. Clean Energy Associates (CEA) just released a new Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) Quality Risks report identifying the most common defects found during 2024 factory audits.

Importantly, no audited systems were shipped or installed with unresolved safety-critical issues. These findings illustrate the value of rigorous quality control to ensure safety and reliability.

Similar to the findings from last year’s report, defects in fire detection and suppression systems (found in 28% of units) and thermal management systems (15%) were among the most frequent. The report also identified issues such as faulty auxiliary circuit panels (19%) and performance or capacity test failures (6%) 

The majority (72%) of discovered defects were at the system level, rather than the cells or modules, indicating that these problems generally arose during the systems integration process.

These findings underscore the importance of proactive detection and timely resolution to maintain safety and reliability.

You can access the full report here.

Clean Energy Associates | https://www.cea3.com/

Westinghouse Electric Company has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Pabineau and Eel River Bar First Nations to promote Westinghouse technology for new build projects at the Port of Belledune.

The initial focus of the agreement explores AP300 small modular reactor (SMR) opportunities with local developers, including the Belledune Port Authority and New Brunswick Power, as well as industrial and data center customers. The agreement also includes the assessment of opportunities for using Westinghouse’s Long Duration Energy Storage technology at the Port of Belledune.

“Pabineau First Nation is excited to sign this MoU with Westinghouse and Eel River Bar for opportunities that will arise from development in the SMR sector. We believe partnership is the key to success, and growing the economy of the province not only benefits First Nations but the whole province,” said Chief Terry Richardson, Pabineau First Nation. “The Port of Belledune offers a great opportunity with land and a deep-water port that gives access to world markets. We look forward to continuing to develop our relationship with Westinghouse.”

“This agreement represents a forward-looking partnership that puts our community, alongside our friends at Pabineau First Nation, at the center of meaningful economic and environmental progress,” said Chief Jake Caplin, Eel River Bar First Nation. “We’re proud to be part of clean energy innovation in our territory that will benefit our community members for generations to come.”

“Indigenous communities are important partners to Westinghouse as we develop infrastructure projects and new build opportunities in New Brunswick,” said John Gorman, President of Westinghouse Canada. “We are pleased to work with Pabineau and Eel River Bar First Nations to explore the deployment of the AP300 SMR, which is based on the proven and operating AP1000 reactor.”

Pabineau First Nation and Eel River Bar First Nation are both Mi’kmaq communities located in northern New Brunswick. Pabineau First Nation is situated along the Nepisiguit River near the city of Bathurst, and Eel River Bar First Nation is located along the Eel River and Chaleur Bay near the town of Dalhousie. As Indigenous rightsholders at the Port of Belledune, both communities work with the port to support regional economic development.

Owned by Canadian energy powerhouses Brookfield and Cameco, Westinghouse offers the only SMR based on an advanced, large Generation III+ unit already in operation globally – the AP1000 reactor. Unlike every other SMR under development with first-of-a-kind technologies and risks, Westinghouse’s AP300 SMR uses AP1000 engineering, components and supply chain to streamline licensing and leverage available technical skills. These factors provide confidence that the first operating unit will be available in the early 2030s.

Westinghouse Electric Company | www.westinghousenuclear.com

Cadeler A/S (“Cadeler” and, together with its subsidiaries, the “Group”) published its Q1 2025 Earnings Release, delivering progress in both financial and operational performance in the same quarter that the company has expanded its operational fleet, having taken delivery of two new vessels.

For the first three months of 2025, Cadeler reported revenue of EUR 65 million, an increase of EUR 46 million compared to EUR 19 million in the same period of 2024.

EBITDA rose to EUR 24 million, an increase of EUR 34 million from a loss of EUR 10 million in Q1 2024.

The expectation for both revenue and EBITDA remains unchanged for 2025 as communicated in Cadeler’s Annual Report 2024: full-year revenue is expected to range between EUR 485-525 million and EBITDA is expected to range between EUR 278-318 million.

Fleet ramp-up and utilisation

In the first quarter of 2025, Cadeler took delivery of two new state-of-the-art jack-up wind farm installation vessels. Wind Maker was delivered to the company in January 2025 and has already begun her first installation job at the Greater Changhua 2b and 4 offshore wind farms in Taiwan, developed by Ørsted. Wind Pace was delivered to the company in March 2025 and will be deployed at an offshore wind farm project in the U.S. under a contract from Q2 2025 to Q1 2026. Both vessels were delivered to Cadeler safely, on time and within budget, and are purpose-built to withstand severe weather conditions and operate at the industry’s most challenging offshore wind installation sites across the globe.

Cadeler’s seven operating vessels achieved a combined utilisation rate of 55.3% in Q1 2025. The utilisation rate is in line with the Company’s expectations and reflects the scheduled drydocking and planned maintenance work scopes, plus time in transit for the Group’s new vessel deliveries.

CEO Statement

"We’ve begun 2025 in line with our expectations," said Mikkel Gleerup, CEO of Cadeler. "With revenue more than tripling and EBITDA returning firmly to positive territory, our investments in fleet expansion and project execution are delivering tangible results. We’ve brought two more vessels into operation (representing 50% of the new builds to be delivered in 2025), which will allow us to continue supporting our clients in Europe, Asia-Pacific and North America with a modern, flexible and capable fleet."

"Our outlook for the year remains strong, with a robust contract pipeline, healthy liquidity, and the strategic headroom needed to support our continued growth. We remain committed to being the partner of choice for next-generation offshore wind projects."

Solidified backlog and global project momentum

Cadeler’s order book for 2025 is substantially filled. As of today’s date, Cadeler’s contract backlog stands at EUR 2,487 million, of which EUR 2,023 million is under firm contract and EUR 464 million under exercisable options. Now 100% of the backlog relates to projects that have received a positive Final Investment Decision (FID).

New agreements signed in Q1 2025 include:

• Two firm contracts signed on 3 February 2025 for the use of the newbuild vessel Wind Mover, with a combined potential value of up to EUR 75 million (read more here); and
• A firm contract signed on 28 February 2025 for Wind Pace’s first deployment in the United States, valued between EUR 67 and 75 million, with work commencing in Q2 2025 (read more here).

Cadeler also signed a notable Vessel Reservation Agreement (VRA) with Ocean Winds for the BC-Wind offshore wind farm in the Polish Baltic Sea, with a potential value of EUR 48–56 million (read more here).

Balance sheet strength and continued investment

As of 31 March 2025, Cadeler’s total assets stood at EUR 2,464 million, reflecting a 27% increase from year-end 2024, primarily driven by fleet expansion. Cadeler’s equity stood at EUR 1,226 million, slightly down from EUR 1,234 million at the start of the year, primarily due to hedging adjustments.

Cadeler continues to invest in its future-ready fleet with funding support from its green financing facilities, including the newly signed EUR 525 million Sinosure-backed A-class Facility, which will support the build of Cadeler’s next-generation A-class vessels.

Cadeler | www.cadeler.com

Kraken, the groundbreaking operating system transforming global utilities, has partnered with National Grid to supercharge the way it serves its customers.

The revolutionary Kraken platform will unlock best-in-class customer service and increase operational efficiency for 6.5 million residential, commercial and industrial energy customers across Massachusetts and New York, as part of a multi-year transformation project.

Kraken’s cloud-based customer service and billing platform will allow National Grid to offer innovative energy solutions and pricing plans seamlessly, leveraging its advanced smart meter technology to better serve customers. The platform will also provide customer agents with the tools and information they need to resolve customer issues and improve the customer experience, while boosting employee satisfaction.

National Grid is the first large-scale U.S. utility to adopt Kraken, which is proven to deliver a top-tier customer experience while streamlining operations. The Kraken platform is trusted by major global utilities and is already contracted to serve over 70 million accounts around the world with utilities such as E.ON Next, EDF Energy, Octopus Energy, Origin in Australia and many more.

By unifying customer operations on a single, intelligent platform, Kraken can process over eight billion data points daily, unlocking deeper insight into customer behaviors and energy usage. This will empower employees with tools to anticipate and address evolving customer needs. Ultimately, the partnership strengthens National Grid’s ability to design innovative energy solutions and deliver a safe and reliable energy system.

Amir Orad, CEO of Kraken, said: “We’re excited to kick off a new chapter with National Grid as they take a major step toward transforming the energy landscape. Together, we’re focused on elevating the customer experience, driving digital transformation, and helping create an AI-powered energy system built for the future. With National Grid leading the way, we’re setting the stage for what’s next in the energy world – and we’re just getting started.”

Bill Malee, Chief Customer Officer, National Grid, said: “Leveraging Kraken’s industry-leading expertise will support our mission to provide exceptional service to our millions of customers across the Northeast. Once fully implemented, the Kraken platform will replace decades-old systems, enhancing the customer experience and reinforcing our commitment to a customer-first approach.”

Kraken | https://www.kraken.com/

National Grid | https://www.nationalgridus.com/

EVgo Inc. (NASDAQ: EVGO) (“EVgo” or the “Company”), one of the nation’s largest providers of public fast charging infrastructure for electric vehicles (EVs), announced that Kim Homenock has joined the Company as Chief People Officer (CPO). Homenock brings 25 years of human resources (HR) and operations development experience within the technology and energy sectors to the Company’s executive leadership as EVgo continues its network expansion across America.

“I am thrilled to welcome Kim to our leadership team as we enter an exciting growth phase, and to help us navigate a rapidly evolving charging landscape,” said Badar Khan, CEO of EVgo. “Fast charging bridges energy and technology, and Kim’s background in both industries will support EVgo’s ability to attract and retain the talent and skills we need to continue scaling our nation’s public charging infrastructure.”

As CPO, Homenock will direct EVgo’s HR strategy to scale for growth, including talent acquisition and management, leadership and organizational development while supporting the overall employee experience to ensure EVgo remains an employer of choice in the charging industry. Spending much of her career overseeing globally dispersed teams, Homenock has expertise in building employee engagement programs that cultivate cross-functional connection. She will oversee the implementation of several initiatives to enhance employee experience as the Company continues to scale its workforce alongside its infrastructure buildout.

With over 4,200 fast charging stalls in more than 40 states today, EVgo plans to more than double its network size to reach at least 10,000 stalls by 2029. The Company has nearly 350 employees and Homenock’s extensive experience overseeing distributed workforces will be invaluable to support EVgo’s future growth as the Company increases roles in construction, engineering, development, operations and maintenance over the coming years commensurate with network expansion.

Homenock comes to EVgo after serving as Chief People Officer of Stem, Inc., a global leader in AI-enabled software and services. While at Stem, she led a global human resources team supporting over 500 global employees and focused on leadership and organizational development, as well as enhancing the employee experience to create an environment that fosters growth, innovation, and operational excellence. Prior to her time at Stem, Homenock held senior leadership positions at Amazon in Devices Software & Services, Transportation, and Operations divisions, supporting more than 150,000 employees through streamlined performance systems and effective employee relations strategies during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Starting in 2000, Homenock spent nearly 18 years in global leadership roles in General Electric—now GE Vernova—business divisions. Homenock began her career at Abacus Recruitment PLC in the U.K. after earning a BA from Brunel University London.

“I am honored to join EVgo and help scale its workforce, strengthen leadership capabilities, and support its operational excellence,” said Homenock. “EVgo is shaping the technology that powers mobility for millions of people across the country, and I am drawn by their strategic direction and mission. I look forward to working with leadership to realize a vision of effortless fast charging for everyone.”

EVgo | www.evgo.com