Vestas processing more than 5 GW in orders

WINDSOR — After a year of record global projects, orders continue to fly into Vestas Wind Systems from a variety of North American projects.

The first six months of this year, the company, with manufacturing facilities in Windsor and Brighton, has been busy pumping out late orders of its largest turbine yet — worth 4 gigawatts from 2023, plus 1.5 gigawatts worth of orders in the first half of 2024. As a result, Vestas manufacturing workers will likely be busy through 2026.

The news sits well with Rich Werner, president and CEO of Upstate Colorado Economic Development, who is charged with working to secure business opportunities in the area.

“Vestas has been a leading employer in our region for years, and to see that the business model is stronger than ever benefits everyone, particularly the additional job opportunities that this growth creates,” Werner said.

Vestas announced in July 2023 that it would invest $40 million in Windsor and Brighton manufacturing plants to develop the infrastructure to build the company’s latest V163 model turbines. Vestas also planned a massive hiring effort beginning with the Windsor plant in 2023, and the Brighton plant this year. The plan was to hire from 800 to 1,000 workers. Many jobs at both facilities are still being advertised.

As a result, more growth may be coming, Werner said.

“It’s a reflection of the sustained commitment to that sector and our ability as a region to support that growth,” Werner said. “We are already seeing renewed interest from multiple suppliers looking to locate or expand operations here.”

The V163-4.5 megawatt turbine is optimized for low to medium wind speeds and designed for the U.S. market to maximize annual energy production and accelerate the clean-energy transition, Vestas reported last year. Vestas’s Windsor blades factory was scheduled to begin manufacturing the V163-4.5 MW turbine in 2023, with the Brighton nacelles factory targeted to produce them in 2024. Both factories continue to support the production of the 2 MW platform, and the Brighton nacelles facility was to continue producing the V150-4.5 MW turbine, according to a Vestas press release.

So far this year, Vestas has received three major North American orders for the V163 turbines, two in the United States and one in Mexico. In the last two months of 2023, however, U.S. orders for the new turbine totaled 3.9 GW for 874 turbines, which all will be delivered and commissioned in the next year or more. That includes one project announced Dec. 27, 2023 for 242 turbines for the SunZia Wind Project in New Mexico totaling 1,089 megawatts — Vestas’s largest order ever, according to company news release. Those turbines will be delivered in 2025, and commissioned in 2026.

Other North American orders so far have steadily streamed in, while the Vestas global market has boomed in all corners of the world from Germany to Argentina to South Africa to South Korea.

The North American order so far this year are:

• July 18, 2024 —   117-megawatt project of 26 V150-4.5 MW wind turbines in the United States, to be delivered in the second quarter of 2025 and commissioned in the fourth quarter 2025.
• July 3, 2024 — 347 MW to power the Pohénégamook – Picard – Saint-Antonin – Wolastokuk (PPAW) wind project in Quebec, Canada. The order consists of 56 Enventus V162-6.2 MW turbines to be delivered in 2025.
• June 28, 2024 — 84-MW order to power a wind project with 38 V110 2.2 MW turbines in the United States. Delivery is scheduled for the third quarter of 2025 and commission in the fourth quarter of 2025.
• March 29, 2024 — 554-MW order of 123 V163 turbines in the United States. Delivery is scheduled for the third quarter of 2026, with commissioning scheduled for the first quarter of 2027.
• March 19, 2024 – 319-MW order in Cimarron wind farm in Tecate, Baja California, Mexico, for Sempra Infrastructure. That order consists of 46 V163-4.5 MW turbines and 18 V162-6.2 MW turbines, and a 10-year service agreement. It is scheduled for a fourth quarter 2024 delivery and commissioning in the fourth quarter of 2025.
• Feb. 26, 2024 — 153MW in the U.S. for 34 V150-4.5 MW turbines to be delivered and commissioned in 2026.
• Dec. 30, 2023 — 135-MW project for 30 V163-4.5 MW turbines in the United States, to be delivered in the third quarter of 2024, with commissioning scheduled for 2025.
• Dec. 29, 2023 — 167-MW order for 45 V150 turbines in the United States, to be delivered by and commissioned by the fourth quarter of 2025.

Most orders for turbines also come with a multi-year service agreement.

In May of this year, Vestas also applied to extend its rail track that would straddle both Windsor and Greeley to accommodate the company’s “largest blade product leaving the factory.”

In its 2023 annual report, Vestas officials lauded 2023 as one of record orders at 18.4GW worldwide.  “Order intake (is) driven by strong growth in both offshore and onshore, especially in the USA,” Vestas reported.

Vestas opened the doors of its 13 million-square-foot North American manufacturing base in Colorado in 2010, assembling towers at its Pueblo facility; nacelles and blades in Brighton and blades in Windsor.

In 2021, Vestas sold its Pueblo tower plant to a South Korean manufacturer, CS Wind, that would make towers for not only Vestas but other wind-energy companies. The company broke ground last year on a 900,000-square-foot expansion that was expected to boost the plant’s overall production to approximately 10,000 wind turbine tower sections per year, according to a press release.

A representative from Vestas did not return a call for comment.

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