Acciona inaugurates its first wind farm in Poland and starts work on the second

Acciona Energy inaugurated its first wind farm in Poland, Golice, with 38 MW. The event, attended by Acciona Energy President Carmen Becerril, coincides with the start of construction work on the second wind farm in the country at Gostyn, with 33 MW. The Company is strengthening its presence in Poland, where it has several wind energy projects under development.

Golice, situated in the province of Lubuskie in western Poland, was grid connected at the end of 2011. The clean energy it generates is equivalent to the consumption of 40,000 Polish homes and will avoid the emission of 77,625 metric tons of CO2 every year. The project received co-funding from the European Union’s Cohesion Fund.

The Gostyn wind farm, where construction work is starting now, is expected to be completed at the end of this year and be fully operational in early 2013. Located in the municipality of Krobia, in the province of Wielkopolskie in the west of the country, it will consist of eleven 3-megawatt (MW) wind turbines of ACCIONA Windpower technology, the biggest installed to date in Poland. They correspond to the AW-3000/116 model with a rotor diameter of 116 meters, which has a sweep area of 10,568 m2, equivalent to the surface area of 1.5 football pitches. The wind turbines will be installed on 120-meter-high concrete towers.

The two wind parks will consolidate the company’s presence in the Polish wind power sector, which has shown strong growth in recent years. In 2011, Poland’s installed wind power capacity increased by 37% to 1,616 MW. If this trend continues, Poland will have between 10,500 MW and 12,500 MW of renewable capacity by 2020, according to forecasts by the European Wind Energy Association.

This estimate is in line with the country’s objective of generating 15% of its electricity from renewables by 2020 to reduce its strong dependence on coal in its energy mix. Coal generates 92% of Poland’s electricity and supplies 55% of the country’s primary energy demand.

Carmen Becerril, Acciona Energy President, said: "Poland is one of the countries in which we want to materialize new projects as part of the Company’s clear strategy to reinforce our international commitments. We are confident that the new legislation being prepared by the Polish government will reinforce the positive drive already underway to achieve an energy mix that is lower in carbon content. We expect the new legislation to provide the regulatory stability needed to carry out our projects".

Poland is the thirteenth country in which Acciona owns and operates wind farms. It joins six others in Europe: Spain, Germany, Portugal, Italy, Greece and Hungary; three in America: the USA, Mexico and Canada; and three countries in the Asia-Pacific region – India, South Korea and Australia. In 2012, ACCIONA Energy will grid connect its first wind farm in Croatia, and at the end of the year will start construction work on another facility in Costa Rica, taking the number of countries with installations owned and operated by the Company to fifteen.

Wind power in Poland

1997: 2 MW
1998: 5 MW (+150 %)
1999: 5 MW (- %)
2000: 5 MW (- %)
2001: 22 MW (+340 %)
2002: 28 MW (+27.3 %)
2003: 58 MW (+107.2 %)
2004: 58 MW (- %)
2005: 73 MW (+25.9 %)
2006: 153 MW (+109.6 %)
2007: 276 MW (+80.4 %)
2008: 472 MW (+71.1 %)
2009: 725 MW (+53.7 %)
2010: 1,180 MW (+62.8 %)
2011: 1,616 MW (+37 %)

www.acciona-energia.com