USA - Major expansion for Vestas Wind Systems

Colorado officials announced today a major expansion for Vestas Wind Systems in what will become the state's largest renewable-energy venture. The Danish firm will build a $290 million wind-turbine complex in Brighton that will employ 1,350 workers. Vestas also plans to develop a separate, $240 million wind-tower manufacturing plant, probably in Pueblo, although the location was not announced today. The two new plants, combined with Vestas' existing wind-blade factory in Windsor, will bring its Colorado investment to $680 million and its total employment in the state to 2,450.

The 178-acre Brighton site will make blades and assemble the gears and electronics that wind turbines use to generate power. The site also will include a technology and production engineering office. Pueblo is being considered as the location for the plant that will make steel towers on which wind turbines are mounted. Vestas is the world's largest wind-energy manufacturer. The company already has a major blade-manufacturing plant in Windsor that will employ 650 people at peak production.

Vestas' presence in Colorado is a cornerstone of Gov. Bill Ritter's "new energy economy" that seeks to make the state a focus of both renewable-energy power plants and manufacturing complexes. "This expansion reinforces Colorado's standing as a national and international leader in clean, modern energy for the future," Ritter said at a news conference today. Vestas originally planned to staff the Windsor blade plant with 400 workers on four production lines, but demand for wind turbines was strong enough that before the plant even opened, it announced plans for six lines and 650 workers.

The plant pays wages of about $30,000 a year for production workers. Higher-paid engineers and managerial employees bring the average salary up to about $37,000. Vestas had sought to locate a new blade facility adjacent to its existing Windsor plant but was unable to negotiate an agreement with Denver- based Broe Group, owner of the Great Western Industrial Park in Windsor. Vestas' plans then grew to develop a larger-scale complex to produce blades and other parts after it was able to secure land in Brighton.

While Vestas has not confirmed Pueblo as a site for building towers, it said earlier this year that a $250 million tower plant employing 400 workers will open in Colorado by 2010. Also earlier this year, Beaumont, Texas-based Dragon Wind said it plans to open a plant in Lamar that will build 262-foot wind-turbine towers. Additionally, ConocoPhillips plans to build a research facility in Louisville that will focus on biofuels and other energy research. The Golden-based National Renewable Energy Laboratory, as well as research centers at the state's major universities, are viewed as providing "intellectual capital" that help draw companies such as Vestas to Colorado.

"Vestas is the first flag planted in the state for manufacturing in the wind-energy sector," Don Elliman, director of the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade, said when Vestas opened the Windsor plant in March. "We hope they'll prove to be something of a bell cow." The Windsor facility is producing about 1,800 blades a year for new wind farms in Colorado and other states.

Vestas has said that the wind-tower plant will produce 900 towers a year. The firm's expansion in Colorado is occurring despite repeated failures by Congress this year to extend a federal tax credit on the production of wind power. The credit expires at the end of this year.