Siemens supplies 80 wind turbines, wind power service in North Sea

www.elp.com
8 Feb 2013

Siemens won an order by wpd Group, Germany, to supply and install 80 wind turbines for the Butendiek offshore wind power plant off Germany's North Sea coast. When it comes online in 2015, the wind power plant's total generating capacity of 288 MW will be sufficient to supply some 370,000 households with ecofriendly electricity.

The agreement also covers a long-term maintenance contract for a period of ten years, the first of its kind for an offshore wind project. Siemens is to provide a new logistics concept that includes a service operation vessel specially developed for deployments to offshore wind facilities. The order volume including service is more than $938 million.

This project company is made up of five investors: Siemens Financial Services, Marguerite Fund, Industriens Pension, PKA A/S (each 22.5%) and wpd AG (10%). Butendiek is the eighth offshore wind power plant order that Siemens has won in German waters and the second in Europe with an equity stake from Siemens Financial Services.

Butendiek, to be erected about 20 miles west of the island of Sylt near the German-Danish border, is the second project-financed offshore wind power plant in Germany for which Siemens is supplying wind turbines and services. The wind turbines, each with a capacity of 3.6 MW and a rotor diameter of 120 meters, are to be erected across a surface area of 26 square miles in waters measuring about 65 feet deep.

Siemens is also bringing a comprehensive service package to the Butendiek offshore project, tailored to ensure maximum long-term exploitation of the wind farm's power potential. These efforts include remote monitoring and diagnostics solutions implemented in conjunction with weather forecasting techniques. Siemens has also developed a new, customized logistics concept for Butendiek: Siemens' service technicians will live and work on board a specially designed ship, the Service Operation Vessel.

Siemens Financial Services, Marguerite Fund, Industriens Pension, and PKA A/S (each indirectly holding 22.5%) provide, as financial investors, a substantial portion of the required equity and have secured the financing of the project with a total project volume of $1.75 billion.

Wpd group will as well contribute to the equity and in addition focuses mainly on project development as well as the project management. All partners have aligned their resources in order to secure a project finance structure on a 67% senior debt and 33% equity basis with a consortium of up to 9 banks, involving multilateral institution like European Investment Bank, KfW and EKF supporting the project with funding.