The Tokyo Electric Power subsidiary Eurus Energy Holdings, Japan’s largest wind power utility, has begun construction of a 60 MW wind farm on the hills around the Norwegian town of Stavanger, in southwestern Norway. It is expected to go onstream as early as the autumn of 2011. The facility will consist of 26 x 2.30 MW turbines made by Siemens AG.
The Norwegian government is subsidising a third of the total cost. A local unit of Eurus will hold a 66% stake and oversee the facility’s operation, with output to be sold to Germany and other European countries through an electricity broker.
Eurus is surveying three other sites in Norway as part of a push to develop wind farms in northern Europe, including Sweden. Its European wind power capacity amounts to a little over 700 MW from facilities in Spain, Italy and the UK while its global capacity now totals 1.9 GW.
