According to an article in Reuters, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries seems to be planning a wind turbine manufacturing plant in Fort Smith, Arkansas. The investment involved in this project is about USD 100 million.
MHI officials will be making a final investment decision after seeing if the demand rises, which is expected sometime in the second half of the financial year 2010.
[source: Reuters]
Farmers and property owners in Benton County, central Missouri, have agreed to explore the possibility of developing a 300 MW wind farm in the area. Some 50 farmers and property owners met at a local high school discussing the idea of building wind turbines at various locations in Benton County.
The preliminary proposal for the wind farm includes the construction of 100-125 wind turbines in the north of the county, which could result in up to 300 MW of clean power generating capacity. Apart from clean electricity, the project is also interesting because it would create jobs for the local community as well.
[source: Kansas city, via: TheWindPower.net]
It seems the wind energy industry is not without its share of fraudulent activities. In Italy, the country's finance police has arrested two of the country's most prominent businessmen from the wind energy sector. The arrested individuals are reported to have been involved in fraud in obtaining public subsidies to construct wind farms. Additionally, the police is also investigating the sales of wind farms to foreign companies.
The arrests were part of an operation somewhat humorously named "Gone With the Wind".
[source: Financial Times]
Suzlon, the largest wind energy technology manufacturer in India, and one of the largest in the world, is having a bit of a cash problem, an unwelcome effect coming from the financial crisis.
The company is engaged in talks with Indian banks trying to renegotiate loans in order to improve the company's balance sheet.
Alternatively, Suzlon may choose to divest more assets, and build up its cash position.
[via: Financial Times]
Maldives are taking on the media in the past weeks, first with the underwater government cabinet meeting, and now with the announcement of a plan to develop a wind farm which will supply about 40% of the island state's electricity needs. Once built, the Maldives will be a country with the highest proportion of renewable energy in the overall energy portfolio, in the world.
The proposed wind farm, according to this article on the Guardian.co.uk, will consist of 30 wind turbines, and will deliver about 75 MW of clean electricity, at full capacity. This is more than enough to power the capital, the international airport and the surrounding resorts. All excess power will be used for desalinization plants, and to produce bottled drinking water from the sea.
A beach on the Maldives - luxury powered by clean energy.
The new wind farm represents a USD 200 million investment, and will be financed and built by Falcon Energy. It will use GE made wind turbines. The next step is to perform a one-year analysis of wind conditions to assess the best placement of the turbines. Afterwards, the wind farm will take another two years to be built.
To provide backup for the wind farm during low wind conditions, a gas turbine is also being planned. Even though the Maldive have moderate winds, they are quite steady year-round, so there shouldn't be too much trouble maintaining wind power generation.
This is not the last bit of news involving renewable energy from the Maldives it seems, as the country it rumored to be preparing another major wind farm development announcement in the coming months.
SeaEnergy and Taiwan Generations Corporation (TGC) have signed an agreement last week to jointly develop offshore wind farms in Taiwan. According to the announcement, the companies will work on various projects, the first of which will be the Changhua offshore wind farm planned to have up to 600 MW of installed capacity.
Changhua offshore wind farm will be located in the Taiwan Strait, off the Changhua county, on the West Coast of Taiwan. The location is stretches from about 2.5 to 10 km from shore in water depths of up to 30 meters. Initially, the wind farm will be jointly owned by TGC and SeaEnergy, but may include other strategic investors in the future. The agreement, SeaEnergy is guaranteed 25% of working interest in the wind farm developments.
The Taiwan government has set 15% as its target for the use of renewable energy sources by 2025. This represents about 8.5 GW of capacity to be installed in total by 2025. Offshore wind energy potential has been identified as one of the major sources of clean energy, with the government anticipating at least about 3 Gw of offshore development.
The British wind energy sector has encountered some hurdles in the past months. Funding is needed to get things going again, as well as legislative changes. In order to kick-start the wind industry in Great Britain, investments are needed, and they may be coming from some unexpected multinational companies. Among the mentioned potential investors are IKEA, the Swedish home products retailer, and Google, the US based web giant, which is already involved in renewable and clean energy investments – Google PowerMeter, solar energy and geothermal.
The rumor seems to be coming from John Lynch, head of power and utilities at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, who told a CBI energy conference a couple of days ago that the sector was attracting interest from various companies who are keen on investing in renewable energy. In addition to Google, another company that was mentioned as a potential investor in the renewable sector is Microsoft. The offshore wind sector is where the UK could be leading the world, so many of these companies are interested in investing in this particular area.
All these companies have environmental coporate goals to achieve. In order to cut their carbon emissions (carbon footprint), the companies are turning towards alternative sources of electricity such as wind, solar, geothermal and others, while also working on improving energy efficiency of their operations. For example, computer data centers consume a tremendous amount of energy, about 2% of total consumption in the US, according to Times Online. One of the possible models of company involvement, would be the purchase of stakes in renewable energy generation facilities.
The UK has set high goals for its environmental target. If tha targets are to be reached, the UK needs to about GBP 100 billion in investments by 2020 to make this happen, with 70 billion going to wind energy development, 10-20 billion for energy transmission systems, and another 10-20 for other things.
The Danish wind turbine manufacturer is reportedly planning to add 250 MW of installed capacity to its wind farm in Kutch, Gujarat, India. This will be another reported plan to expand existing wind power capacity, apart from Suzlon Energy's plans to also add wind power capacity to its existing wind farm.
The 250 MW expansion represents a Rs 1750 crore (about EUR 255 million) investment by Vestas. Currently, the company has about 60 MW of installed and operational wind power capacity in Kutch. The company wants to exceed 300 MW of installed capacity in Gujarat, and plans to add the new capacity over the next year or so.
Kutch wind farm. (Image: windpowerworks.net)
Furthermore, Vestas has signed a memorandum of understanding with the state government for developing 1000 MW of wind power projects in the state, totalling in Rs 7000 crore (about EUR 1.2 billion).
Vestas has obtained all the necessary government clearances for the 250 MW expansion, and is now looking for investors for this project.
Another possible wind energy project for Vestas is the Tamil Nadu 100 MW wind farm. In total, the company plans to add some 1.2 GW of wind power capacity in the state in the long run.
Gujarat state government has plans to add about 3 GW of wind power in the next three years. Currently, the state has about 1.5 GW of wind power installations. Overall, the state's wind energy potential exceeds 10 GW.
[via: Business Standard]
PT Medco Energi is planning to invest USD 400 million in a geothermal project, the company's second this year, in northern Sumatra. An additional USD 100 million would be spent for the development of a food crop and biofuel project in Papua island, according to this article. The company's core business is oil and gas, so these are moves towards diversification.
The start of the new project is expected to happen this year. The food crop and biofuel projects will bring the development of 1 million hectares of land in the country's easternmost island. Plantation for food crops and biofuel feedstocks in Papua will be designed to meet the increased demand in the future.
[via: Think GeoEnergy]
Following Ontario's recent new price supports for the renewable energy industry, the Canadian province is seeing quick results. Two large renewable energy projects may be happening in the future.
One of the projects seems to be coming from Canadian Hydro Developers Inc., a company which has just signed an agreement to acquire an offshore wind project in the Great Lakes, bordering Ontario. The second project may involve South Korea's Samsung C&T Corporation, for the development of a large wind power project in the province.
Canadian Hydro has acquired an offshore project from US based Wasatch Wind Inc., which could eventually become the largest in the world, with rights to build up to 4.4 GW of capacity. The first 500 MW are scheduled to come online by 2014.
On the other side, Samsung "seems" to be in "serious discussions" for the development of a large renewable energy project in the province, according to Ontario's Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure. Further according to Canadian media, Samsung's plans involve the construction of 200 wind turbines on the northern shores of Lake Erie. Test towers are also planned this fall to measure and collect data for assessment of the area's potential for wind energy power generation. No official commentary from Samsung or the ministry has been released yet, so this is filed under "rumors" for now.
[via: Wall Street Journal]
