Oct 11 2006
American Superconductor Corporation, a leading energy technologies company, announced today it has received a follow-on order for 450 PowerModule(TM) PM1000 systems from Windtec Systemtechnik GmbH (Windtec). Windtec, based in Austria, is a developer and licensor of proprietary wind turbine system designs and a developer and supplier of wind turbine electrical systems. Windtec will package the PowerModule systems with other electronic components for one of China's largest domestic wind turbine manufacturers. This new order is a three-fold increase over the previous PowerModule order from Windtec, which was announced in February 2006.
According to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC), China's installed base of wind generated electricity is expected to grow from 1,260 MW in 2005 to 2,000 MW by the end of 2006, a 59% annual growth rate. GWEC forecasts that the installed base will more than double to 4,750 MW over the next four years, and according to a Chinese State plan, it will reach 20,000 to 30,000 MW in 15 years.
"AMSC and Windtec have worked closely together to customize PM1000 systems to provide voltage regulation and electrical controls for several Windtec wind energy system designs," said Windtec President Gerald Hehenberger. "AMSC's PowerModule systems are best-in-class, and they provide us with tremendous flexibility and capability in the systems we design for our customers. Windtec looks forward to expanding its relationship with AMSC and to capitalizing together on the rapidly growing wind power market."
The PowerModule systems will be shipped primarily in AMSC's fiscal year ending March 31, 2008. This is the fourth order that Windtec has placed with American Superconductor during the last 12 months and is the largest PowerModule order in company history.
"The global wind energy market has become a significant growth area for AMSC, and we expect this will continue for many years," said Greg Yurek, chief executive officer and founder, American Superconductor. "Windtec is a key channel to the Chinese market for our PowerModule systems. We expect to continue to work closely with them to meet the objective of China and additional fast-growing countries around the world to generate more zero-emission electricity from wind."
With this order, American Superconductor will be serving more than 2,500 megawatts (2.5 billion watts) of wind-generated electricity with its D-VAR(R) and PowerModule solutions, exceeding by 25% the company's 2,000-megawatt target for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2007.