1. World’s biggest floating wind turbine to go online end of 2019

Windplus, a consortium of utilities EDP, ENGIE and Repsol, and clean energy firm Principle Power, has announced the development of an 8.4MW floating wind turbine in Viana do Castello in Portugal.

The floating wind turbine is claimed to be the world’s biggest and is expected to come online at the end of 2019.

The wind turbine has been developed by ABS and is the first of three ABS-classed, SEMI Submersible Type units that will make up for a total of 25MWs of floating offshore wind power.

This is continental Europe’s first large-scale floating wind farm.

Christopher J. Wiernicki, the CEO of ABS, said: “Floating turbines enable us to reach offshore wind resources in water that is too deep for conventional bottom-fixed turbines. It is breakthroughs such as this that will make a vital contribution to the global transition to clean energy.”

2. GE wins 715-MW wind turbine supply contract in China

The renewables subsidiary of US conglomerate General Electric (NYSE:GE) will build a 715-MW onshore wind farm in China’s Henan Province under a newly signed deal with China Huaneng Group Co Ltd.

The Chinese state-owned power producer has contracted GE Renewable Energy to supply 286 units of its 2.5-132 turbines, with 130-metre soft steel towers. The project in Puyang prefecture is expected to be completed by July 2020, at which point the wind farm will have the capacity to produce enough power per year to supply some 500,000 homes in the province.

This is the single-largest onshore wind contract ever awarded to a foreign wind turbine manufacturer in China and also GE’s largest-ever wind order in Asia, it said in a statement. The company noted that the 2.5-132 turbine model was designed specifically for the low-wind-speed needs of the China wind regime and are made by GE in China.

Previously, the two sides worked together on the 151-MW Huaneng Dali Longquan wind project in Yunnan, which utilises GE’s 2.75-120 turbine.

Source : Smart Energy & RN

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