Largest wind turbine blades and offshore wind farm vessel ready

» By | Published 22 Aug 2012 |

Siemens new 75m turbine. Copyright Siemens

Two new technological developments in the global wind power industry have been garnering media interest recently as the emissions-free generating sector continues to increase its world-wide installed capacity year after year after year.

Siemens announced earlier in August that it had built, at 75 metres, the world’s largest rotor blade for wind turbines.

By way of comparison, and to understand just how long the new Siemens blade is, those who attended EWEA’s Annual Event in Copenhagen in April 2012 may remember that massive LM Wind Power 73.5-metre blade displayed outside the Bella Center.

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Local newspapers paint the real picture on wind energy

» By | Published 21 Aug 2012 |

North Hoyle offshore wind farm

While this blog frequently focusses on wind power reporting in national-level newspapers, the regional-level or local newspaper does not get as much attention as it perhaps merits.

Last month I was in North Wales – a coastline which is home to the UK’s first large scale offshore wind farm called North Hoyle. It currently has one other operating offshore wind farm – Rhyl Flats, and a massive development is underway further out to sea at Gwynt y Môr offshore wind farm which, when completed in 2013, is set to provide electricity to cover nearly one-third of homes in Wales.

There is, of course, local opposition. On this particular stretch of coastline the opposition group is called Save Our Scenery – slightly ironic given that the new offshore farm is 18 km offshore and will be frequently out of vision thanks to the often dense banks of Welsh cloud.

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Seeing which way the wind blows, off the French shore

» By | Published 07 Aug 2012 |

Support for the onshore wind industry in France has blown hot and cold in recent months, but government backing for offshore was reinforced in April by its decision to award tenders to build offshore wind farms to produce 2 GW of energy. French company Nass&Wind Offshore, is taking full advantage of this momentum and investing in LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) measuring devices – a move it believes will give it a competitive advantage when the government decides to release a second offshore tender later this year.

LiDAR is an optical remote sensing technology that Nass&Wind is using to measure the speed of wind and turbulence up to an altitude of 200 metres – higher than the nacelle generally located 100 metres above sea level, says the company. Nass&Wind has now installed two of these devices off the coast of western France to try to accurately determine the power production potential of planned offshore wind farms.

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Wind power will grow by 100 terawatt-hours per year – IEA

» By | Published 23 Jul 2012 |

Wind power will be the second biggest contributor to global renewable electricity generation by 2017, according to a ground-breaking report by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Despite economic uncertainties in many countries, global power generation from renewable sources including wind will increase by more than 40% to almost 6,400 terawatt hours (TWh) – roughly the equivalent of one-and-a-half times current electricity production in the US, predicts the Medium-Term Renewable Energy Market Report 2012.

This is the first time the IEA has devoted a medium-term report to renewable power sources and the agency says this is “a recognition of the dynamic and increasing role of renewable energy in the global power mix”. It forecasts that renewable electricity generation will expand by 1,840 TWh between 2011 and 2017, almost 60% above the 1 160 TWh growth registered between 2005 and 2011.

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Brazil’s wind energy sector powers ahead

» By | Published 19 Jul 2012 |

Wind power development in Brazil, South America’s largest and most populated nation, has been much in the news recently with a report that more than 88% of the country’s electricity came from renewables last year.

The preliminary report from Brazil’s Energy Research Company has revealed that wind power increased more than any other renewable power source, responsible for a 24% increase between 2010 and 2011.

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