Youwind leads the shift to hybrid wind power plant design with storage

February 24, 2026 Articles & PR | Market insights | Onshore 5 min read time

The first SaaS platform integrating BESS and H₂ into wind farm design from early-stage project development is a reality

The energy transition is accelerating, and with it the complexity of renewable power plants. Wind farms are, especially for onshore, no longer developed as standalone generation assets — they are increasingly conceived as hybrid power plants, combining generation with storage to manage variability, and maximize return of investment.

At Youwind, we have captured this need some time ago and we see this shift not as a future trend, but as a present reality. As projects become more complex, the need to integrate storage from the earliest stages of design in a user-friendly way has become essential. This understanding has driven the latest expansion of the Youwind platform.

We are proud to announce that Youwind now enables the modelling of hybrid wind power plants, integrating wind generation with storage technologies — starting with Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS), and with hydrogen (H₂) modelling to follow later this year — all within a single, collaborative web-based platform.

As Anna Rivera, CEO and co-founder of Youwind, explains:

“We are ready now to support the screening and design of wind farms, including storage, and to bring our customers a trusted revenue optimizer for their future and existing assets. BESS is a key piece to include from early project phases, and we are proud to be the first web-based solution to offer this expanded suite of capabilities.”

From generation-only to holistic power plant design

Until now, tools in the wind energy industry have treated generation and storage as separate exercises, often analysed using disconnected workflows and late-stage assumptions. However, as grid constraints tighten, forced curtailments are relevant in some countries, and revenue optimisation becomes more complex, this approach is no longer sufficient.

Hybridisation is no longer optional. Storage is becoming a core design parameter, influencing layout, infrastructure, electrical design, and ultimately project economic viability.

With this new module, Youwind becomes the first SaaS platform in the wind energy industry that allows developers to model a holistic wind power plant — combining:

Wind generation

Electric power infrastructure

Storage systems, starting with BESS and expanding to H₂

All assessed together, from early-stage project development.

Addressing variability from early-stage phases for smarter decisions

One of the defining challenges of wind energy is variability in production. Storage provides a powerful solution — but only when it is properly integrated into the project design and treated as a hybrid system.

By enabling storage modelling from the outset, Youwind allows developers to:

Evaluate hybrid configurations before key design decisions are locked in

Understand spatial and infrastructure implications early including exclusion zones and topographic constraints.

Explore trade-offs between wind capacity, storage size, and layout, for better business case understanding.

This approach supports better-informed decisions, reduces late-stage redesign risk, and increases overall project certainty.

First priority: short-term storage with BESS

The first priority of Youwind’s hybrid modelling capabilities has been short-term storage, specifically Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS).

Designing battery layouts that integrate efficiently with available land and existing wind farm layouts has traditionally been a time-consuming and fragmented process. With Youwind, flexible BESS layout design is now faster, simpler, and fully integrated with the rest of the wind farm model.

Developers can adapt battery placement to real project constraints, perform rapid layout iterations, and assess business case sensitivities — all within the same environment used for wind farm design.

As Knud Kragh, former innovation manager at European Energy and managing director at Blue Dawn Energy, who has worked extensively with turnkey BESS projects, explains:

“Working with BESS turnkey projects for many years, this solution comes at the right time. It has been developed with robustness, enabling quick BESS layout design and business case sensitivity analysis. Youwind has brought a real solution to what the industry was missing — developed by experts to be used by a wide range of users — and you can feel it when you use it.”

Expanding hybrid modelling with hydrogen later this year

While the initial focus is on BESS, Youwind’s hybrid roadmap extends beyond short-term storage. Hydrogen (H₂) modelling capabilities are planned to be introduced later this year, enabling longer-duration storage concepts to be assessed within the same holistic framework.

This phased approach ensures that each technology is introduced with the depth, robustness, and usability required for real-world project development.

Built with industry expertise, validated by experts

This launch is the result of months of focused development, leveraging Youwind’s internal expertise within wind farm design and electrical engineering with external validation. The new capabilities have been validated by both industry experts and key research institutes, such as CITCEA-UPC or TUM, ensuring the approach reflects real-world project needs and emerging best practices.

As the energy transition continues to evolve, Youwind remains committed to expanding its platform in line with how wind projects are actually developed — moving beyond isolated analyses toward fully integrated, hybrid power plant design.

Written by Youwind Content Team

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