A single blade for the SWT-2.3-108 wind turbines ordered by MidAmerican Energy weighs about 10 tons. That's as heavy as two full-grown elephant bulls — but spread on a blade-length of 53 meters (174 ft.). (Credit: Siemens AG, Munich/Berlin)
Siemens, a German multinational engineering and electronics company, will supply 448 wind turbines to MidAmerican Energy Company, an energy company based in Des Moines, Iowa. According to Siemens, this is not only not only the largest wind turbine order for Siemens, but also the largest single order for onshore wind power awarded globally to date.
The wind turbines, each with a nominal rating of 2.3 MW and a rotor diameter of 108 meters (354 ft.), are to be installed in five different projects in Iowa. Siemens will also be responsible for service and maintenance of the wind turbines.
“Siemens not only leads the way for offshore wind power worldwide, we are also a very successful player in the onshore wind industry. In Europe and Africa alone, we successfully installed more than 1 gigawatt in the last fiscal year. This new order from MidAmerican Energy once again highlights that we are one of the leading suppliers in the U.S. wind power market,” said Markus Tacke, CEO of the Wind Power Division of Siemens Energy.
Iowa is a leading U.S. state in wind power generation with 24.5% of the state’s electricity generation coming from wind in 2012. With the completion of several projects in mid-2012, wind power in Iowa has 5,137 MW of capacity, third only to Texas and California. Estimates by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) indicate Iowa has potentially 570,700 MW of wind power using large turbines mounted on 80 meter towers. Iowa ranks seventh in the country in terms of wind energy generation potential due to the strong average wind speeds in the midsection of the U.S.
MidAmerican Energy has started construction on five projects in Iowa totaling over 1,000 MW of capacity. The projects, expected to be completed by the end of 2015, are in O’Brien, Marshall, Webster, Grundy, and Madison counties. At a cost of some 1.9 billion dollars, this will be Iowa’s largest economic development project to date. The largest project, the Highland project in O’Brien county, will have 500 MW of capacity, making it Iowa’s largest.
Siemens has already installed 1.2 GW of wind power capacity for MidAmerican Energy to date. Including this new order, these wind projects will provide around 660,000 American households with wind power when they are completed in 2015.
The nacelles and hubs for the wind turbines of this major order will be assembled at the Siemens plant in Hutchinson, Kansas, and the rotor blades will be produced by Siemens in Fort Madison, Iowa.
