VESTAS BUILDING WIND BOOM IN COLORADO

Vestas Makes Colorado a Clean-Energy Hub
Jeremy Miller, May 5, 2009 (NY Times)

"Vestas, a wind turbine manufacturer based in Denmark, is helping Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter get a little closer to realizing his vision of establishing the state as a hub of the “New Energy Economy.”

"Last year, Vestas opened a blade-manufacturing plant in Windsor…Later this year, the company will open a tower-manufacturing factory in Pueblo…When completed, the Pueblo factory will be the largest wind tower-manufacturing facility in the world, turning out 900 towers a year…A third Vestas plant producing blades and nacelles (the energy-generating parts of the turbine) will be opened next year in Brighton. At full operation, Vestas’s three Colorado plants are expected to employ 2,500 workers statewide."

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"Vestas is just one of a handful of wind turbine manufacturers – including Polymarin Composites, Wind Water Technologies, Brevini, Moventas and TPI Composites – that have announced the opening of plants in various states over the last year…

"…Colorado held particular appeal for the company because of its central location, proximity to transit links, qualified workforce and a supportive regulatory regime…[Vestas also sees] Colorado, which ranks eighth nationally in wind capacity, and has an estimated 122 gigawatts of potential in solar and wind energy, as a large potential market for renewables."

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"But rapidly increasing the nation’s clean energy capacity means building miles of transmission lines from thousands of remote generators. A report from the energy department released last year said that in order for renewables to meet the federal target of providing 20 percent of the Unites States’ energy by 2030, $60 billion must be invested in the nation’s transmission lines.

"…[Vestas believes] building a domestic supply chain for the 8,000 or so precision parts used in wind turbines – bolts, ball bearings and gears – is also vital to a fully mature and sustainable American wind industry, which the Department of Energy estimates could employ as many as 180,000 workers by 2030…[M]ost of the precision components for wind turbines are made in Europe and Asia…Vestas [is also opening] a purchasing office in Chicago…"