Wind energy in Finland: ABO Wind Oy orders nine Nordex N131/3000 wind turbines

Business in Finland continues to grow for Nordex: a major customer, ABO Wind, has ordered nine turbines from the 3 MW series with a rotor diameter of 131 metres through its Finnish subsidiary, ABO Wind Oy. Preparations for installation of the N131/3000 machines for a wind farm in western Finland are to start this winter and the wind farm will be fully operative in autumn 2017. Nordex is also responsible for service and maintenance of the turbines for a period of 15 years on the basis of a Premium Service contract.

The site in the municipality of Jämijärvi lies around 90 kilometres to the north-west of Tampere in the region of Satakunta. It is characterised by good wind speeds of 7 m/s on average. The wind farm is intended to produce some 99,771 megawatt hours of green electricity per annum. It is planned to install the cold-climate version of the turbines for ABO Wind.

With this order Nordex further improves its position in Finland, an important wind market where the manufacturer has been active via a subsidiary since 2011. “ABO Wind is a long-standing customer of Nordex with projects in Germany, France, Ireland and now Finland too. We are very pleased to note the confidence once again placed in our technology and service,” says Nordex CSO Sales & Marketing Patxi Landa.

“We have been active in Finland since 2013 and number among the leading project developers there. With our four projects already set up or under construction, we are installing 83.1 of the approximately 2,000 megawatts of wind energy with guaranteed feed-in remuneration,” says Dr. Klaus Pötter, Managing Director of ABO Wind Oy. Three further projects totalling 80 megawatts have been approved and have a secure grid connection. In addition, five projects with 150 megawatts are under development: “We hope to be able to implement these within the framework of coming tenders.”

The Group has installed around 20 GW of wind energy capacity in over 25 markets. In 2015 Nordex and Acciona Windpower generated combined revenues of EUR 3.4 billion. The company currently employs a workforce of more than 5,000. The joint manufacturing capacity includes factories in Germany, Spain, Brazil, the United States and India. The product portfolio is focused on onshore turbines in the 1.5 to 3.6 MW class, which are tailor-made for the market requirements in developed and emerging markets.

Founded in 1996, the company initiates wind farm projects, acquires sites, carries out all the technical and commercial planning, prepares international bank finance and installs the turbines on a turnkey basis. ABO Wind has already connected 581 wind turbine generators and seven biogas plants with a nominal capacity of 1,200 megawatts to the grid. Around 400 employees realise projects with an investment volume of EUR 250 million per annum.