TransAlta announced the completion of the Ardenville project in Alberta and the Kent Hills 2 project in New Brunswick, surpassing 1000 MW of installed wind energy capacity in Canada. The company now operates a total of eighteen commercial wind energy facilities in the country, in the provinces of Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick.
[source: TransAlta]
Gamesa recently signed supply deals with three Chinese companies, totalling in 251 MW of wind turbines to be delivered in 2010. The company is to deliver 197 units, 25 of which are G90-2.0 MW units (50 MW) to Datang Renewable Power, 124 G58-850 kW units (105 MW) to Henan Weite Wind Power, and another 48 G90-2.0 MW units (96 MW) to Guangdong Nuclear Wind Power.
Gamesa recently announced a strategic plan for the period between 2011-2013 which calls for a total of 4000 MW of sales, about 1300 MW of which is aimed at the Chinese wind energy market.
[source: Gamesa]
Verbund held a groundbreaking ceremony marking the start of construction activities at the Reißeck II pumped storage hydropower plant in Austria. The power plant will have 430 MW of installed power generating capacity, and represents an investment of about EUR 385 million. Completion of the power plant is planned for 2014.
GeoDynamics, operator of the Innamicka "Deeps" joint venture between the company and Origin Energy, announced the Jolokia 1 project (Australia) has reached a milestone. The company has successfully completed drilling operations, and is now ready to begin with the hydraulic fracture simulation of the granite beneath the surface in order to create a geothermal reservoir. The purpose of fracturing rock is to create a passage way for the water, to be injected from the surface, allowing it to reach hot and deep hollow spaces in the granite, to pick up geothermal heat, and turn into steam. That stem is then extracted back to the surface and used to power steam turbines to generate electricity.
Suzlon Energy announced 168.5 MW of new orders received from various customers in the corporate, PSU and SMB segments in India.
Yingli Solar announced the company is planning to expand its manufacturing lines with another 700 MW of capacity at the company's HQ in Baoding, in the Hainan province in China.
GE inaugurated the company's first wind generator manufacturing facility in Vietnam, located in the port city of Hai Phong. The facility will manufacture wind turbine components, supporting the company's customers worldwide. GE may expand the facility in the future, to include the full range of power generation equipment.
Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide a USD 2 million technical assistance grant for the establishment of the Asian Solar Energy Forum. The forum will be a knowledge sharing and communication platform for the solar sector in Asia. The stakeholders will be able to exchange information on technologies and business models necessary for the expansion of solar energy in this part of the world.
ABB announced the company has been awarded contracts worth more than USD 50 million for maintenance of offshore wind farm connections to the mainland grid. The wind farms are located in the North Sea, off the coast of Germany. The maintenance service period under the contract is three years. The contracts were awarded by TenneT TSO (formerly transpower).
First Solar announced plans to build two new manufacturing facilities, one in the United States and the other in Vietnam.
The two new plants will boost the company's annual production capacity with about 500 MW. The increased production will help the company meet the rising demand from its customers, involved in solar energy development projects around the world. The company has already made additional production capacity plans in Malaysia, France, Germany, as well as the expansion of the company's Ohio (US) facility. Once the new facilities are completed, First Solar will have almost doubled production capacity to about 2.7 GW in 2012.
[source: First Solar]
