Siemens tests powerful wind turbine

OCTOBER 10, 2012—Siemens began field testing of its new, huge 154-meter rotor for the six-megawatt (MW) offshore wind turbine in Østerild, Denmark. The direct-drive wind turbine is equipped with the world’s longest rotor blades – each blade measures 75 meters in length. With a record rotor diameter of 154 meters—that’s more than one and a half times the length of an American football field—each SWT-6.0-154 turbine can produce 25 million kilowatt hours of clean electricity in offshore locations, enough to supply 6,000 households. Østerild is a windy site near the coast and offers very favorable conditions for initial testing on shore.

This past July, Siemens entered into a framework agreement with the Danish energy group DONG Energy for the delivery of 300 of the 6 MW offshore wind turbines (shown at right), which are expected to be installed off the coast of the U.K.

DONG Energy has its hand in a number of offshore wind projects. On Sept. 24, for example, it announced that the first power was being fed into the Danish power grid from the Anholt offshore wind farm, which will become the largest of its type offshore Denmark in 2013.  The Anholt offshore wind farm will have 111 wind turbines of 3.6 MW capacity each that will generate 400 MW of power—equivalent to the annual consumption of 400,000 Danish households. Siemens is also supplying the wind turbines for Anholt.