Alstom’s wind energy

The France-based Alstom has been the exclusive supplier to the consortium led by EDF EN which includes Danish energy specialist Dong Energy, a world leader in offshore wind farms, along with the developers Nass & Wind and WPD Offshore.

Alstom will be carrying out projects at the the three sites: Saint-Nazaire, Courseulles-sur-Mer and Fécamp, and it will provide a total of approximately 240 turbines.

Orders will be made on a site-by-site basis starting in 2014, once a feasibility and environmental impact study for each project has been done. For Alstom, this represents orders amounting to over €2 billion, which are to be filled over a period of several years.
    
Alstom will employ 1,000 people and indirectly it will create 4,000 more jobs when it sets up four factories and invests €100 million in France's offshore wind industry.

The plan represents the first stage in a campaign to create a national industry that will set the standard for offshore wind power. This investment will help meet the needs of the French market and the booming European market.

Plan implementation is to begin in 2013 with recruitment and the installation of the first factories in Saint-Nazaire and Cherbourg. Production is due to start in 2014.

Alstom has already contacted several hundred local firms to identify and organise subcontracting operations, bringing the total number of permanent jobs resulting from the project to 5,000.  

Nacelle and generator manufacturing facilities will be located dockside on a 14-hectare tract of land in the Montoir-de-Bretagne port area of Saint-Nazaire and will employ 300 people. Blades will be made by the LM Wind Power in Cherbourg where the towers will also be made.

These two plants will create another 500 jobs. In addition, an engineering and R&D centre employing 200 people and dedicated to marine energies, the first and only set-up of its kind in France, will be established in the Pays de la Loire region.

"Alstom can confirm its industrial plan following the announcement of the results of the call for tenders. This represents the first step towards creating a French industry able to set the standard in offshore wind power and bolsters Alstom's growth strategy in wind technology," said Alstom chairman and CEO Patrick Kron.

The Haliade 150 pre-series production run has begun in Saint-Nazaire at a temporary facility that will manufacture 40 units before the main factories come on-stream.

The first Haliade 150 turbine was installed at the Carnet site, near St-Nazaire, and will be used for testing prior to certification. A second offshore turbine will be delivered in Belgium in autumn 2012 for a second round of tests at sea.