Russia's Rosatom 'to build wind turbine blades' at former Vestas plant
Rostom has plans to develop 1GW of wind capacity in landlocked Kyrgyzstan
Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom will manufacture wind turbine blades at a plant formerly owned by Danish manufacturer Vestas, the governor of Russia's Ulyanovsk region has announced via the Telegram messaging platform.
Vestas closed a factory that produced turbine blades at the Ulyanovsk site in 2022 and left Russia altogether in 2023, leaving its assets behind.
Rosatom, one of the largest investors in Russia's wind power, will be able to produce up to 450 blades per year from the plant, Reuters reported, citing a Telegram posting by Aleksey Russkikh, regional governor of Ulyanovsk.
The Ulyanovsk factory may supply blades for export to Kyrgyzstan, where Rosatom plans to build 1GW of capacity, Rosatom chief executive Alexei Likhachev was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying.
Renewable energy was among the industries affected by sanctions imposed by Western countries after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. The sanctions attempted to cut Russia off from Western technologies, components and finance.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said last April that it would take two to three years for Russia to replace wind farm components supplied by foreign manufacturers that had left the market.
On its website, Rosatom states that it has commissioned 1GW of wind power capacity since the launch of its renewables division in 2017 and will increase its total capacity to about 1.7 GW by 2027.
Earlier this month, Rosatom’s renewable energy unit reportedly signed an investment agreement with Kyrgyzstan for the construction and operation of a first 100MW wind farm, located in the Issyk-Kul region of the Central Asian Republic.
In January 2022, Rosatom and Kyrgyzstan’s Ministry of Energy also signed a memorandum of cooperation to construct nuclear power plants in the country.
Arbitration
The dispute erupted in 2023 after Fortum launched arbitration proceedings claiming more than €200m ($208m) for unfulfilled turbine deals relating to wind farms planned by its former Russian subsidiary WEDF before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The pair later agreed to a settlement waiving any past, present and future claims related to their legacy business activities in Russia.
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