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OKAlpiq to help prevent forest fires in Sicily by installing special cameras on wind turbines
The fire safety cameras will be installed at Alpiq Energia Italia's Monte Mele wind farm in Realmonte and Agrigento, Sicily.
Alpiq Energia Italia and the responsible authorities in Sicily have entered a cooperation agreement that will see a new approach to combating forest and bush fires and environmental crime on the island. As part of a pilot project, entitled “Sentinel Towers of the Territory”, Alpiq Energia Italia will be the first operator to install fire safety cameras in a wind farm in Sicily. Thanks to the agreement with the region, supported by Sicily’s Regional Energy Department, Alpiq has drawn up this pilot project to support Sicilian wind farms involved in repowering operations. The Swiss-based energy group has operated in the Italian market for many years, with 14 plants delivering an overall capacity of around 770 MW.
“We decided to take up a recommendation from Italy’s Specialised Technical Commission,” explains Massimiliano Bignami, Alpiq's country manager for Italy. “We started a discussion with all the bodies involved in order to establish guidelines that would then be extended to all other operators.” Alpiq has a deep-rooted presence in Sicily and has operated on the island for around 15 years. “We know the importance of adapting to the specific conditions on the island and working closely with the local authorities to explore ways of improving the environment in which we operate. Fires are a huge problem in Sicily, and even a small contribution like this can be fundamental in terms of prevention. We are proud to be the first company to address this issue as part of the pilot project,” says Massimiliano Bignami.
A few months ago, the Specialised Technical Commission added a new permit requirement obliging wind energy producers to equip their plants with cameras. However, the guidelines on the type of instruments to be used and how they interface with the region are still lacking. “With the ‘Sentinel Towers of the Territory’ project, Alpiq is pioneering the initiative with the bodies involved to create a comparison model that can also be applied to other operators,” adds Massimiliano Bignami.
Alpiq's Monte Mele wind farm in Sicily serves as a pilot project
The pilot project will involve the Monte Mele wind farm in Realmonte and Agrigento, whose 10 operational wind turbines are set to undergo repowering. As part of the repowering project, Alpiq will provide cameras that are compatible with the new layout and capable of monitoring a large area.
After discussing the idea with Regional Energy Councillor Roberto Di Mauro and General Manager Calogero Giuseppe Burgio, Alpiq took part in a technical round table convened by the Energy Department, which was also attended by the regional heads of Civil Defence, the Fire Brigade and the Forestry Corps as well as representatives from the software company Sicilia Digitale. Together with Alpiq, these representatives will accompany specific technical aspects of the project, providing input among other things on the equipment required to interface with the control bodies and the areas most affected by criminal activities.
As part of the plans drawn up by the Sicilian Region, an extensive network of powered and wired cameras will be set up and connected with the operational centres of the regional Civil Protection and Forestry Corps. At each wind farm, several cameras, compatible with the distance between the towers of the plant, will be set up to avoid overlaps and interference. The cameras will cover an area compatible with the control requirements: on average, about 5 kilometres from each wind turbine.
“This highly targeted measure equips local authorities with an additional means of responding to the fires,” says Regional Energy Councillor Roberto Di Mauro. ”It will transform a renewable energy plant into a sentinel providing an early warning of phenomena such as fires that have devastated our land. If the initiative were extended to the more than 1,500 wind plants on our island, we could provide Sicily with hundreds of firefighting towers. This project also showcases the benefits of healthy collaboration between the public and private sectors, at zero cost to the Region's coffers and with enormous benefits in the area of prevention.”
The cameras to be installed will be purchased, installed, networked and maintained through Monte Mele, at no cost to the Region. The technical specifications, installation methods and routine maintenance activities will be agreed in advance, also in order to prevent any interference with the proper operation of the plant. Images and data of any kind recorded by the cameras will be the property of the Sicilian Region, which, in addition to assessing and establishing which criminal phenomena it intends to detect, will exclusively assume all obligations relating to the proper processing of personal data, including sensitive data, confidentiality, copyright and intellectual rights of any kind. The Sicilian Region will therefore be solely responsible for ensuring compliance with data protection, confidentiality and intellectual property legislation, including obtaining all the necessary authorisations, without any liability for Alpiq.