India - Suzlon completes retrofit programme of wind turbine blades

India's largest wind turbine manufacturer Suzlon Energy has said it completed the worldwide programme for strengthening and reinforcing a certain set of blades, which suffered cracks. "We are happy to report the completion of the programme in September, 2009. This project has been a priority effort for us," Suzlon Wind Energy Corporation Chief Executive Officer Andy Cukurs said. Suzlon Wind Energy is a part of the Suzlon group.

At the completion of the programme, only 179 blades of the total fleet of 1,251 blades developed cracks. However, Suzlon upgraded the entire fleet in support of its customers, the company said. "... In keeping with our commitment to our customers, (we) decided to retrofit the entire S88-V2 fleet and replace the few cracked blades at our own cost to eliminate any possibility of further issues, no matter how small the chance," Cukurs added.

Instances of blade cracks were first discovered in late 2007 in the operation of some of Suzlon's S88 wind turbines in the United States. Pursuant to this, a comprehensive retrofit operation was launched to safeguard 1,251 (or 417 sets) of S88-V2 blades around the world — a commitment which is worth around $100 million. The commitment of $100 million had already been provided in the financial year 2008-09, hence there would be no additional retrofit costs in the fiscal year 2009-10, Suzlon said.

Earlier, shares of Suzlon suffered huge losses on domestic bourses — the Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange — after news reports of cracks in the S88-V2 blades. Besides, strengthening the S88-V2 blades, Suzlon has also introduced the next-generation S88-V3. One of Suzlon's S88 turbines produces enough energy to power around 500 average American homes. During this retrofit operation, Suzlon worked with Germany-based wind energy certification firm Germanischer Lloyd, to test and certify the V2 blades according to international standards.

"Through this process Suzlon has developed a new level of blade testing for all its blades by putting increased loads into the test process which exceed current industry standards, raising the bar in product design and testing for the industry as a whole," the company said.

For more information please contact Trevor Sievert at ts@windfair.net