Xinjiang Goldwind Science and Technology Company, China’s leading wind turbine manufacturer, has integrated the country’s first 1.5-megawatt direct-drive permanent magnetic wind turbine for high-altitude areas into the country’s power grid, the company said Thursday in Beijing.
This wind turbine has been installed on a pilot wind farm for high-altitude facilities on Xitie Mountain, located in northwest China’s Qinghai Province.
The pilot wind farm was constructed by the China Three Gorges New Energy Corporation. The farm’s total installed power capacity maxes out at 3 megawatts, with the ability to generate about 6 million kilowatts of electric power every year.
Wu Gang, Goldwind board chairman, said “We will properly improve the wind turbine according to its performance and then produce it in mass quantities.”
The wind turbine was tailor-made for China’s southwest and northwest areas, also known as the cradle of China’s wind power industry, Wu said.
The turbine uses technological advancements such as larger blades to function more efficiently and generate more power in high-altitude areas.
Goldwind has integrated several varieties of its wind turbines into China’s power grid, including low-wind-speed, offshore, high-altitude and high- and low-temperature wind turbines.
Wu said his company’s Goldwind 87/1500 wind turbines are particularly suited for China’s vast low-wind-speed areas, which cover about half of the country. Goldwind installed and integrated nearly 100 wind turbines in low-wind-speed areas. These turbines are about 5 percent more efficient than turbines of the same size from other manufacturers.
About 90 percent of China’s existing wind farms are constructed in non-high-altitude areas. But in high-altitude areas such as Yunnan and Qinghai provinces and the Tibet Autonomous Region, which boast rich wind resources, wind turbines have yet to be installed.
The China Wind Energy Association (CWEA) says that high-altitude areas that are fit for wind power development in these three western regions extend for more than 9,000 square kilometers, giving them great potential for generating power.
By the end of 2010, Goldwind’s wind turbines accounted for about 90 gigawatts of China’s total installed power capacity.
Wu said, “These turbines have the ability to save 7.28 million tons of coal and reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 18.14 million tons.”
