RWE Innogy has started the construction of its first onshore wind farm in Poland. The first of a total of 18 wind turbines has now been erected in Suwalki in the north east of the country. The Siemens turbines with an installed capacity of 2.3 megawatts each will generate about 80 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year to supply the equivalent of more than 40,000 residential households. The construction of the wind farm is due to be complete as early as this autumn.

In the run up to the actual erection phase, the foundations of the wind power systems were created and the underground grid connection cables were installed in the last few months. RWE Innogy built some new access roads and modernised existing ones for the delivery of the rotors each weighing 60 tons and the nacelles each with a weight of over 80 tons as well as the rotor blades each being 45 meters long. Over 100 employees of companies from the region will be working on site during the construction phase. Another wind farm with an installed capacity of approx. 35 megawatts is due to be erected in Tychowo (Western Pomerania) as early as next year. RWE Innogy intends to have a total wind farm capacity of about 300 megawatts installed in Poland by 2015. Potential projects with a volume of 730 megawatts are currently being explored to this end.

In the United Kingdom, too, the construction of the second offshore wind farm Rhyl Flats off the Welsh coast is making progress. The first of altogether 25 wind turbines was installed successfully last week. The individual wind power systems are erected from a mobile construction platform, which first collects the tower and turbine elements in the nearby Mostyn harbour and transports them to the construction site at sea. The floating platform is firmly anchored on the seabed with extendible pillars on site. The tower, rotor and nacelle will then be lifted up to a height of over 80 meters for final assembly by means of a heavy-duty crane.

According to current planning, the first wind power systems of Rhyl Flats will generate electricity before the end of this summer. Once complete, the wind farm with its installed capacity of 90 megawatts can supply the equivalent of approx. 61,000 residential households per year with electricity in the United Kingdom and save several ten thousand tons of CO2 each year.