Vestas Develops Highly Customised Power Plant Solution To Secure 42 MW Order In Finland

Vestas has received a 42 MW order for the Långnabba wind project. The project will be developed by Vind AX AB, a Finnish developer and independent power producer, and new customer for Vestas. The project will be located on the Åland Islands, in the Baltic Sea, between the Finnish and Swedish mainland.

As Åland’s largest wind power project to date, the project leverages the versatility of Vestas’ 4 MW platform, comprising ten V136-4.2 MW turbines with 112m towers. To ensure a maximised energy production over the lifetime of the wind project, Vestas and Vind AX has signed a 25-year Active Output Management 5000 (AOM 5000) service agreement. Under this contract and supporting job creation on the Åland Islands, Vestas has engaged Allwinds AB, a local service provider, to support Vestas’ service team at the Långnabba wind project.

“We are delighted having contracted the wind turbines for Långnabba with Vestas, who has a long experience and solid knowledge in the wind industry”, states Leif Nordlund, Project Manager of Långnabba. “Having closed a service agreement, locally anchored through Allwinds, they will be Vestas’ extended arm on Åland in terms of servicing the turbines”.

“We are pleased to have been awarded this project, and look forward to supporting Vind AX AB in an initiative that will transition Åland's energy consumption to be powered by 65 percent wind energy, a significant leap forward from just 18 percent in previous years.This contract win is further proof of Vestas’ ability to assist Finland in its transition towards a green energy system”, says Nils de Baar, President of Vestas Northern & Central Europe.

The Långnabba wind project at its Åland Islands’ location is characterised by a very demanding grid environment with extraordinarily low short circuit ratios, making it prone to instabilities. Leveraging its industry leading grid capabilities, Vestas has developed project-specific settings on control parameters, involving both key wind turbine components and the power plant controller. This configuration will ensure a cost efficient and reliable connection between the wind project and the grid.

“The highly customised power plant solution for Långnabba demonstrates Vestas’ commitment to technology leadership in the grid arena. We keep adding valuable levers to enable and improve projects in similar weak grid topologies, a condition that we foresee becoming increasingly prevalent in the future,” states Jan Hagen, Vice President, Technical Sales Northern & Central Europe, Vestas Power Solutions.

Once commissioned, the project will produce over 130 GWh of energy per year, which corresponds to the electricity consumption for approximately 10,000 households in the Åland Islands.

With this deal, Vestas reinforces its presence in Finland`s wind market, where we have installed roughly 400 wind turbines with a total capacity of almost 1.3 GW to date.

The contract includes supply, installation and commissioning of the wind turbines, as well as a VestasOnline® Business SCADA solution, lowering turbine downtime and thus optimising the energy output.

Deliveries are expected to begin in the third quarter of 2021 and commissioning is planned for the first quarter of 2022.