Wind Turbines Manufacturer in China

Chinese wind turbine maker XEMC Group has forged a strategic partnership with Irish renewables firm Gaelectric Holdings, the companies announced this week.

Under the deal, Gaelectric will work with XEMC to develop three onshore wind turbines farms in Ireland totaling 13.6 megawatts, worth a combined $26 million, Gaelectric Chief Executive Brendan McGrath told reporters at a Monday signing ceremony in Dublin.

“With the backing of XEMC’s industrial strength and technological capacity and their track record and commitment to long term relationships, we are confident that Gaelectric’s portfolio of wind farm sites will be realized to the highest commercial and technical standards,” he said.

The deal marks the European debut of turbines made by the state owned XEMC Group of Hunan, China, which says it has 820 of its XE series direct-drive, permanent magnet wind generator, or PMG, wind turbines installed in China.

Another key element of the deal, McGrath said, is that XEMC will co-develop Gaelectric’s remaining wind energy projects in Ireland and the United States.

Initially, the agreement covers three onshore farms at Roosky in County Roscommon, Leabeg in County Offaly and Crowinstown in Westmeath, Ireland, the companies said.

McGrath said his March visit to China satisfied him that XEMC had a sufficient commitment to research and development, which “combines Dutch engineering design and pedigree with Chinese industrial power.”

Together, he said, the companies “share a vision for the significant opportunities from offshore wind energy generation on which we are already working closely together.”

“Gaelectric’s pipeline of wind farm projects in key locations in Ireland and the U.S., combined with our shared focus on innovation in renewable energy technologies, makes us ideal allies in co-developing Gaelectric’s portfolio of renewable power projects,” XEMC Group Chairman Zhou Jianxiong told reporters.

The Irish Industrial Development Agency called the XEMC-Gaelectric partnership an important development in the history of Chinese-Irish business cooperation, the Irish technology news Web site SiliconRepublic.com reported.

While an increasing number of wind turbines manufacturers in China have started to adopt direct-drive permanent magnet technology, rare earth minerals, some of the core raw materials used to produce wind turbines, are becoming a significant barrier to their development.

The recent price surges have forced many industry players to halt production or create a complete industry chain by expanding into the upstream sector. The price hikes are expected to intensify the already fierce competition in the sector, causing those who lack capital and expertise to be squeezed out altogether, according to an industry insider.

Rare Earth Price Skyrockets

China’s rare earth prices have risen significantly since July 2010, exceeding 200 percent since the beginning of this year, with some categories reaching 600 to 1,000 percent.

One of the key reasons for the price explosion is the Chinese government’s introduction of a levy on rare earth resources as of April 1 of this year, said Zhou Jianxiong, Chairman of Hunan province-based Xiangtan Electric Manufacturing. In addition, on May 19th the State Council of China released a document outlining the council’s viewpoint on the sustainability and development of the rare earth sector in a move to regulate the market.

According to a report from Guolian Securities, the price of rare earth is expected to continue the upward trend in the second half of this year.

A Bubble Emerges

Following five successive years of impressive growth, China’s wind power sector saw its growth rate decline to 37 percent in 2010. With nearly 100 small wind turbine manufacturers in China, total production capacity for 2011 is expected to reach 29 GW, far exceeding the actual demand of 15 to 18 GW. This trend is evidence that the rapid development of the wind power market has led to excessive competition and accelerated formation of a bubble.

China has, in recent years, come to dominate the global market for solar panels, but it has so far installed little in its country – just 0.8 gigawatts in a grid that has grown to nearly 1,000GW. It has preferred to use the world market – which has grown to more than 40GW of installed solar capacity – as its test tube, and to refine its products.
And, it has also been conscious of the problems of its wind industry, which grew so quickly that many turbines were either of sub-standard quality or could not be connected to the grid, and it has learned carefully from those failures. Now, it seems, it is prepared to hit the “Go” button.
China does have more than 100 million homes that use solar hot water, but unlike other countries, China’s solar market is expected to be dominated by utility-scale projects rather than rooftop panels, as most people live in units and apartments. And rather than jumping in with huge projects as their first investment, as is occurring in Australia, the Chinese have been keen to understand what works and what doesn’t.
Over the past few years, China has been testing various solar tariffs on a regional or on a strictly targeted basis – offering incentives for a series of utility-scale solar projects that have started at modest size and have gradually been scaled up – 1MW, 5MW, 10MW and then 20MW – before now being rolled out on a national scale.
The structure of the tariff is also fascinating. At 1.15 renmimbi/kwh ($A0.16) for projects approved before July 1 and falling to 1 RMB for projects approved since then, the tariff is the lowest national tariff in the world. Clearly, China does not think it needs much to kick start the domestic solar industry. There are several reasons for this.
The cost of solar has dropped so rapidly in the past two years that solar is now thought to be already competitive with wind in many regions in China wind generator , some of which have excellent solar radiation, particularly in the western desert regions. These regions can produce solar energy at double the efficiency of other regions. China also needs a smaller tariff than other countries because of lower labour costs and supply chain advantages (they make the stuff there).
And it is also close to parity with coal-fired power for local industrial users who, unlike other countries, pay a significantly higher tariff than individual consumers. According to one report, LDK Solar, China’s most integrated solar energy company, expects the levelised cost of energy of its solar modules to fall below average grid levels in China to around $US0.07/kwh in 2012. It’s a massive irony, and an amazing opportunity for the solar industry that the (coal-fired) electricity used by companies such as LDK of wind turbines and Jinko Solar to make their modules is already more expensive than the energy produced from those modules.

U.S. Department of Energy and the Interior Ministry has released the first American in the history of offshore wind power on the planning inter-agency cooperation, the report entitled “State of offshore wind power strategy: creating the U.S. offshore wind industry.” The plan focuses on three main issues to solve: the relatively high cost of offshore wind power, installation, operation and grid-technical challenges, the field data and the lack of experience in project approval procedures.

Chu said the plan would stimulate innovation, increase employment, the development of clean energy, helping the U.S. win in the new century, more competitive. The U.S. government pledged $ 50.5 million investment plan, the focus includes the following three aspects:

Technology development (5 years, invested $ 25 million): support innovative fan design tools and hardware development. Specific tools will include the development of open source computing, system optimization concept of offshore wind farms as well as optimizing the next generation of offshore wind turbine rotor coupled system and control system development.

Remove market barriers (three years and $ 18 million): support for the deployment of offshore wind limit the key industry sectors and factors of the basic research and targeted environmental studies. Details to include offshore wind power market and economic analysis, environmental risk reduction, small wind turbines manufacturing and supply chain development, and transmission planning and network strategy, the best infrastructure and operations.

The next generation of transmission (three years and $ 7.5 million): Funding the development of the next generation of fans and improved transmission, which is cost-effective offshore wind power required for a core technology.

In addition, identified four areas in the Atlantic wind. The four regions are in the wind generators outside the continental shelf offshore of Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey and Virginia.

Offshore wind power in national strategy, the U.S. Department of Energy 2020, offshore wind power capacity will reach 10 million kilowatts by 2030 reach 54 million kilowatts. The effective use of offshore wind energy, will help establish the United States to achieve Obama’s “2035, 80 percent of its electricity from renewable energy” goals.

Currently, coal-fired power plants account for about 75 percent of electricity in China. Generating electricity from wind has proven useful in reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases as well as in curbing global warming. The World Energy Council estimated that every 1 million kilowatts of wind-generated electricity will save about 600 tons of carbon dioxide emissions on average.

China has great advantages for the development of wind power generation. China is a country with a vast territory and abundant wind energy resources. The total wind power of China is more than 3 billion kilowatts, ranking first in the world. In addition, the average wind speeds of most places of China are more than 3 meters per second, and the best wind speed for wind power generation is between 3 and 25 meters per second. Of these places, the northeastern region, northwestern region, southwestern plateau, Inner Mongolia, coastal regions and islands have especially-qualified wind speeds for wind power generation and huge potentials for the development of the industry.
Currently, wind generator has become the leader of Chinese green energy industries, but some problems have also emerged successively.

Lin said frankly that power grid integration is still the largest difficulty that blocks the development of China’s wind power generation.

It is difficult to control the stability of wind power when integrating it to the grid, which has very high demand both on the stability and long-distance conveyance of wind power. Statistics show that 10 percent of wind power is wasted because wind power is poorly integrated into the grid, and the grid cannot bear the load.

Wind power will continue to lead the development of China’s green energy in the next few years. Statistics from the National Energy Administration show that by 2015, China’s wind power installed capacity will reach 100 million kilowatts and can save about 80 million tons of standard coal when the annual energy output exceeds 200 billion kilowatt-hours, and wind power as a proportion of total energy will increase from nearly 1 percent in 2010 to about 2 percent.

Tianjin’s first wind farm – Binhai New Area Dashentang wind farm, line 7, live operation. After 240 hours after the trial run, in mid-September the access network in Tianjin, Binhai New Area to provide for an annual 52.13 million kwh of green power.
Reporters at the scene saw 7, 13 sets of 80 meters as the unit like a large white windmill along the coastline of the Bohai Sea in order of priority, very spectacular. Dashentang wind farm project 13 units with a total installed capacity of 2.6 million kilowatts. The wind turbine project has created three “highest in the country”: One is the domestic roadbed installation run the single largest capacity, the unit capacity of 0.2 million kilowatts; the second is the longest diameter of the blade diameter of 93 meters; Third scientific and technological content, with completely independent intellectual property rights.
According to reports, a large wind farm is Shentang Tianjin’s first wind power project, energy consumption is far lower than the traditional indicators of coal-fired units. To consume 355 grams of standard coal power generation as one kwh conversion standard, large wind farm Shentang annual savings of 19,000 tons of standard coal. Meanwhile, the annual saving 30,400 tons, 60,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, 88 tons of nitrogen oxides, soot 10.4 tons, 39.2 tons of sulfur dioxide, to promote energy conservation in Tianjin, Tianjin to meet the new eco- City of renewable energy utilization rate greater than 20% of the requirements has created important conditions.
Dashentang wind farm project is the first case the use of advanced distributed access wind farm, from the power terminal to the access network, the distance is only 8.1 km, how much fat, how much, less power loss, maximum reduce the loss of power transmission link, significantly improve energy efficiency and input power quality.
Dashentang or domestic wind power project construction in the eight first seismic intensity of the wind farm area, for areas with harsh geological conditions, the accumulation of experience in wind farm construction. State Grid Power Company of Tianjin, although wind turbines is unstable, but because of Tianjin Power Company in advance of the technical studies, wind farm design, construction, access to relevant technical processes are carried out to prepare during the test run will not Binhai New Area affect network security, stability, and formally put into operation after the Tianjin Binhai New Area and will not affect the main power grid network security.
Tianjin has become China’s wind power equipment manufacturing base. Land-based wind energy resources in Tianjin Binhai New Area are mainly concentrated in coastal areas, high wind speed time to focus in March to May, followed by February and June, the time is relatively low in August and September.

China’ s largest wind power developer, signed a share purchase agreement with a Canadian power company on Wednesday, marking the company’s first foray into the global wind power market.

Under the agreement, Longyuan Canada Renewables Ltd., a subsidiary of Longyuan Power, will purchase equity shares of a 100-megawatt (MW) wind farm that is being built by Farm Owned Power (Melancthon) Ltd., a Canadian power company based in Ontario, Canada.

Industry insiders say the project will be completed in about two years, but did not give a precise starting time for the project.

When completed, the project will be able to supply electric power for 30,000 households, Longyuan said.

The deal marks the first time for a Chinese state-owned power company to invest in a wind power project located overseas. Longyuan kicked off its efforts to purchase the equity shares in November 2010.

Xie Changjun, general manager of Longyuan, said Canada small wind turbines boasts rich wind power resources and excellent supporting policies for its wind industry, which have helped to create an ideal investment and operation environment for wind farms.

According to Denmark-based consultancy company BTM Consult, Canada had the largest amount of installed wind power capacity in North America by the end of 2010, just after the United States. According to its provincial wind power development plans, Canada will have 12 gigawatts (GW) of installed wind power capacity by 2016.

Longyuan’s wind farms totalled 6.56 GW of installed wind power capacity by the end of 2010, the single largest amount in Asia and the third-largest in the world, according to a BTM report.

Longyuan has been vigorously exploring the global renewable energy market in recent years, establishing offices in South Africa, the United States, Canada and Europe.

Longyuan said it has made substantial progress in establishing wind power generators projects in South Africa, in addition to its advances in Canada.

The end of 2010, China’s total wind power installed capacity reached 44.73 million kilowatts, more than the United States ranked first in the world. At the same time, offshore wind has started. Last February, China’s first offshore wind farm demonstration project, is Asia’s first large-scale offshore wind farm – Shanghai Donghai Bridge, the electric field of 10 million Wahe Shangfeng 34 units installed, and then in June to achieve grid , to provide electricity for 40 million families. In addition, the domestic first offshore wind power generators concession projects in the same year work started in May. Was vividly in 2010 compared to offshore wind power development in China the first year.

China Wind Energy Renewable Resources Institute, Qin Haiyan, secretary general that the reason for China’s great attention to offshore homemade wind generator , not as many European countries because of depleted land resources development, on the contrary, China’s onshore wind resources, there is great development of space. To develop offshore wind power, more from the natural resources, climate change, economic and other aspects into account results.

Potential

Although offshore wind power generation in equipment installation, transportation, maintenance and other than the existence of onshore wind power generation more difficult, but there are still a lot of China’s development benefits: for example, 5-25 m depth within the sea, 50 m height wind can be installed capacity of about 200 million kilowatts; 5-50 m depth, 70 meters high installed capacity of wind turbines can be about 500 million kilowatts. Traditional offshore wind power near the load center, to facilitate power-consumptive, can reduce long-distance transmission troubles.

China Wind Energy Renewable Resources Institute, said Commission Vice-Chairman Shi Pengfei, 2015, China’s offshore wind power installed capacity will reach 500 million kilowatts and even than expected, but compared to last year, more than 900 million kilowatts of electricity installed capacity, the ratio still very small, expect offshore wind to ease the current shortage is not the reality, the exploration of offshore wind is more for energy conservation, climate change considerations.

The worker, standing inside a section of what will eventually be a wind turbine, looks up as a piece of equipment on a rope is gently lowered inside through a hole.

Wearing an orange helmet, a grey T-shirt and once-white gloves that have long since turned grey, he manoeuvres the machinery as a colleague outside reaches in to help.

He works frantically inside the huge circular frameto which vast blades will be attached.

Outside this warehouse-style factory building in Baoding, a city a couple of hours south-west of Beijing that is home to 170 green-technology companies, are the 40-metre-long small wind turbine blades. They appear elegantly sculpted as they lie side by side in countless rows.

Nearby, protected from the elements by cloth for wind turbine generator coverings, are scores of nacelles, the frameworks that contain all the power-generating parts of the turbine.

It is perhaps no wonder that this facility, belonging to the state-owned Guodian United Power Technology, is churning out wind turbines by the dozen.The market for them in China is booming.

Last year, the country installed almost 19 gigawatts of new wind energy capacity, taking its total to 45 gigawatts, the largest in the world.

Companies such as Guodian, which supplies all the components except the huge towers on which the turbines sit, have boosted production to capitalise on the vast investment in the sector.

Guodian produced 100 wind turbines in 2008, 600 in 2009 and 850 last year, all for domestic use. This year, thanks to the opening of new facilities, the company’s annual production capacity will increase to 2,000 turbines, says Wang Hongbin, the company’s deputy general manager.

China will increase its offshore wind power installed capacity to 5 gigawatts (GW) by 2015 and 30GW by 2020, the National Energy Administration said Wednesday.

The public tender for the second round of offshore wind power generators concession projects with a total installed capacity of 1.5GW to 2GW will be completed during the first half of 2012, the administration said at a meeting held in the city of Nantong, Jiangsu province.

China faces a 30GW power shortfall this summer, according to data from the China Electricity Council.

Liu said the country should expedite the establishment of an advanced and fully-equipped offshore wind power industry to boost its large-scale development.

In June 2010, Shanghai’s East Sea Bridge’s 100MW offshore wind turbine generator farm project was completed. It is currently the only offshore wind farm that has been put into operation outside of Europe.