ABOUT CONTINUUM
Continuum is an open-source wind energy software tool developed by wind professionals for the wind industry and supported by One Power Company. It includes all tools needed to generate wind energy production estimates and to determine a site's suitability.
ABOUT ONE POWER COMPANY
One Power Company is an industrial power company that helps large energy users build modern, tailored, on-site power grids for their facilities. In doing so, the company is decarbonizing manufacturing, enabling customer control, and building the customer-centric power grid of the future. As a vertically integrated enterprise, One Power provides physical solutions including Wind for Industry® and ManagedHV®, as well as analytics and commercial offerings to enable end users to fully customize their energy experience.
Founded in 2009, One Power Company is a Utility 2.0 company, and is the largest installer and owner of behind-the-meter wind energy in the United States. Learn more about the customer-centric power grid of the
future at www.onepower.com.
LEAD DEVELOPER
Liz Walls
Liz Walls has been working in the wind industry since 2007 and is the creator and lead developer of the Continuum® wind energy software. Liz holds two US patents related to the Continuum® wind flow model algorithm, which uses all available meteorological data and a self-learning algorithm to form site-calibrated wind flow models.
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In 2007, Liz graduated with a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from UMass Amherst where she studied at the Renewable Energy Research Lab (now the Wind Energy Center). She then began her career in wind as a member of the SecondWind team (now Vaisala), helping develop the Triton Sonic Profiler®.
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In 2010, Liz entered the wind consulting space after taking a position with RAM Associates led by meteorologist Jack Kline. While at RAM, Liz co-developed the wind flow software tool RAMWind, and developed a new wind flow model algorithm that combines field observations with fluid mechanics theory.
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In 2014, Liz co-founded Cancalia Engineering & Consulting, LLC, released the first version of Continuum®, and was granted the first of two US patents related to the wind flow model algorithm.
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In 2016, Cancalia was acquired by distributed wind energy company One Power Company, based out of Findlay, OH. The team at One Power identified the value in open-source software and the need for it in the wind industry. Thus, the plan to create and freely distribute Continuum® was formed.
While at One Power Company, Liz held the position of Head of R&D and was involved in many different aspects of research, including strain gauge measurements of foundations and turbine blades. During this time, Liz developed a suite of software tools needed for planning a wind project (in addition to the wind flow and wake loss modeling tools available in Continuum® 2). These tools included met data filtering, MCP, exceedance modeling, and others. The tools were merged into one wind energy software package: Continuum® 3. This new generation of the software was published to the public domain on GitHub in October 2019.
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In 2020, Liz moved to the Pacific NW with her husband and started a new position as a Senior Renewable Energy Engineer and Lead Software Developer with ArcVera Renewables. In this role, Liz and the software team built out a suite of software applications for both pre-construction and operational wind farm analyses which streamlined several processes and boosted productivity.
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In 2023, Liz rejoined One Power but this time as Director of Renewable Energy Services within the One Power Energy Services team. In this position, Liz is able to focus once again on Continuum® development and has added several features to the software including a met data time series module, terrain complexity estimates, and an improved reanalysis data module. In addition to research and software development, the OPES-RES team offers renewable energy consulting services including pre-construction energy assessments and operational wind farm analyses.
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Liz continues to lead the development of Continuum® and is dedicated to sharing this open-source tool with the wind industry.
PRODUCT MANAGER
Erin Roekle
Erin Roekle has been active in the energy industry since 2012, beginning her career in the wind industry and now contributing to all facets of energy. She earned a Master of Science in Atmospheric Science from Texas Tech University, where she specialized in numerical weather prediction and data assimilation. While she was a graduate student, Erin was a part of the DOE-sponsored Wind Forecast Improvement Project (WFIP) that aimed to improve short-term forecasts specific to wind energy activities.
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In 2012, Erin joined Meso, Inc. as a Research and Development Scientist/Meteorologist based in Albany, NY. There, she continued to advance wind energy forecasting while expanding her expertise into solar energy forecasting and gaining a broader understanding of the operational energy sector.
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Erin transitioned into wind energy development in 2015 when she joined One Power Company, based in Findlay, Ohio. She was instrumental in developing processes, methods, and algorithms for pre-construction energy production estimates for behind-the-meter wind applications. In this role, she became involved in financial analyses of utility costs and other energy management initiatives.
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In 2016, Erin began collaborating with Liz Walls at One Power Company on several R&D projects, including the evolution of the Continuum® wind energy software, which was eventually published as open-source software on GitHub in 2019. Erin’s attention to detail and ability to blend user experiences with technical software development were critical to the success of these projects, with many of her contributions being integrated into the Continuum® suite.
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In 2022, Erin took a step back from the energy industry and worked as a Project Manager for a civil engineering consulting firm in their land/site development division. She managed a variety of commercial and residential projects involving infrastructure design and permitting.
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A year later, Erin returned to One Power Company as their Principal Energy Advisor, splitting time between the One Power Energy Services team and the Project Planning & Technology department. In these roles, she provides energy management consulting for commercial and industrial users, remains an in-house expert on pre-construction resource assessments, and leads new resource assessment research. In addition, Erin has the role of Continuum® Product Manager as she continues to guide and shape the development of the open-source tool.
CONTRIBUTORS
Developing Continuum® 3 was only possible due to the many people who have contributed to the source code, documentation, and model methodology. Thank you to everyone who helped bring Continuum® to the industry!