The wind turbine manufacturing firm Acciona from Spain has opened a new concrete tower production plant in Mexico.
The $650m Ventika complex will feature 84 units of 3 MW Acciona Wind power turbines and will have an installed capacity of around 252 MW.
The plants will generate concrete segments for towers using the in-house technology developed by Acciona.
The farms located at General Escobedo, near Monterrey will be operated and maintained by Acciona for 15 years. These plants are slated to go live in 2016.
Commenting on the new plant, Acciona Energía CEO Rafael Mateo said: “The creation of this tower plant shows our ability to provide innovative, efficient and profitable solutions in an increasingly demanding market, and confirms our strong commitment to the Mexican wind power sector.”
ALSO READ Acciona Energia wins award for Polish wind power solutions
This is Acciona’s largest project to date worldwide using concrete towers. The firm has also installed concrete turbine towers in Brazil.
Acciona is installing its AW116/3000 machines for a development company featuring Fisterra Energy, Cemex and other private investors.
In November 2014, Acciona completed a turbine supply agreement with Apex Clean Energy for the development of 165 MW Cameron Wind farm, purchased by IKEA.
According to the agreement, 55 ACCIONA Windpower AW125/3000 turbines will be supplied under a 20-year Full Service Warranty.
The Cameron Wind farm is located in South Texas and marks the first installation of AW125/3000 turbines in the U.S.
Acciona owns and operates 557 MW of wind power generation capacity in Mexico, nearly 23 percent of the country’s total installed capacity.
The firm is currently developing 202 MW, including Ventika and the US$111mn, 49.5 MW Ingenio wind farm in Oaxaca for Actis and Comexhidro wind farm.
So far, Acciona has executed 540 concrete wind turbine tower projects in Brazil, Mexico, Spain, South Africa, Poland and the US totaling 1493 MW. Of these, 250 have already been installed.
Sabeena Wahid
editor@greentechlead.com