Stoked about wind power ? by Bruce J. Oreck

The visit to the factory and wind energy site was very successful, and impressed by his visit Mr. Oreck has written about it in his electronic journal. See the story of the visit here.

WinWinD is delivering four pieces of three megawatt WWD-3 wind turbines to Haminan Energia Oy for the Summa Wind Farm. The hub height and rotor diameter of the turbines is 100 meters. The turbines were erected in May, and are now commissioned and operational.

Stoked about wind power …

Finland is on the verge of implementing a “feed-in” tariff to help accelerate the expansion of renewable wind power within its borders. In my opinion this is a great idea and despite some misunderstanding on the part of the public, Finland actually has a wind profile that can be very effectively exploited. And in order to meet the goals it has set for itself on CO2 emission reductions, Finland will have to get going right now on the installation of hundreds on wind turbines. So here is something else many people are not aware of, in the highly competitive market for large scale wind power, Finland manufactures several leading edge products.

Because solving the world’s non fossil fuel energy needs and addressing the climate change challenges are going to be cooperative efforts among many nations, I made the point to go visit and learn more about the innovative wind turbine WinWInd, a product designed, engineered and built in Hamina, Finland.

WinWind was founded about 10 years and now has manufacturing operations in both Finland and in India. The Indian facility focuses on smaller, 1 mw wind turbines while the facility in Hamina makes the 3 mw version. What is unique about the WinWInd product is the fact that it has been designed to operate using 30% fewer moving parts. On top of that, its design is ideal for lower wind sites. And through its use of a planetary gear system, WinWInd turbines should be able to provide significantly higher run intervals and fewer periods of downtime for maintenance.

Now while a wind turbine looks simple from the outside (just an oversized pin wheel), in reality, it is an immensely complicated piece of equipment. So visiting the WinWind factory was absolutely fantastic. These babies are big … really, really big! I am talking about 450,000 kilos for a 3 mw unit (including the post it sits on). Each component seems gigantic and when assembled into a complete unit, it is well, immense!

Wind power has a critical role to play right now and Finland clearly has its sights set on being one of the world’s leading manufacturers and users of this wonderful, clean, renewable resource.

www.winwind.com

www.usembassy.fi/ambassadorsjournal/