GE Wind Energy is a branch of

GE Renewable Energy GE Renewable Energy is an American wind turbine manufacturer division of General Electric headquartered in Boulogne-Billancourt, Greater Paris, France focusing on production of energy from renewable sources. Its portfolio of products includes win ...

, a subsidiary of

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable ene ...

. The company manufactures and sells

wind turbine A wind turbine is a device that converts the kinetic energy of wind into electrical energy. Hundreds of thousands of large turbines, in installations known as wind farms, now generate over 650 gigawatts of power, with 60 GW added each year. ...

s to the international market. In 2018, GE was the fourth largest wind turbine manufacturer in the world.

History

Enron Wind acquisition era (2002-2015)

The entity was created as developer (not manufacturer) Zond in 1980 by James G.P. Dehlsen, who also formed Clipper Windpower in 2001.

Enron Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. It was founded by Kenneth Lay in 1985 as a merger between Lay's Houston Natural Gas and InterNorth, both relatively small regional compani ...

acquired ''Zond'' and the German manufacturer ''Tacke Windtechnik'' in 1997. In 2002, while

gas turbine A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directio ...

sales were declining, GE acquired the Enron Wind, the only surviving US manufacturer of large wind turbines at the time, during the bankruptcy proceedings of its parent, Enron. GE increased engineering and support for the Wind Division and doubled its annual sales to $1.2B in 2003. By acquiring ''Zond'', GE gained a very important patent for variable-speed systems (), which had a major impact on the North American market. Enron had continued production of the 1MW and 1.5MW wind turbines of ''Tacke Windtechnik'' and GE has expanded production in Germany. GE acquired ScanWind in 2009, and in 2011 Wind Tower Systems LLC, a manufacturer of

space frame In architecture and structural engineering, a space frame or space structure ( 3D truss) is a rigid, lightweight, truss-like structure constructed from interlocking struts in a geometric pattern. Space frames can be used to span large areas w ...

wind turbine towers.

Growth and acquisitions (2015-)

After the acquisition of

Alstom Alstom SA is a French multinational corporation, multinational rolling stock manufacturer operating worldwide in rail transport markets, active in the fields of passenger transportation, signalling, and locomotives, with products including the A ...

's energy generating assets (2015) GE's wind portfolio was expanded to include the 6-megawatt 'Haliade' offshore turbine (at that time one of the world's most powerful turbines) from

Alstom Wind GE Offshore Wind is a joint venture with Alstom and a subsidiary of GE Renewable Energy, created in 2015 when most of that company's other electrical power and generation assets were acquired. GE's stake in the joint venture is 50 % plus 1 share. ...

. This became GE Wind (offshore). The same year, GE added Blade Dynamics Ltd., a designer and manufacturer of modular wind turbine blades with principal facilities on the

Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight ( ) is a county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the largest and second-most populous island of England. Referred to as 'The Island' by residents, the Is ...

and in

Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...

. GE acquired LM Wind Power from

Doughty Hanson & Co Doughty Hanson & Co is a British private equity fund manager focused on leveraged buyout and recapitalization transactions primarily of upper middle-market companies in Europe. The firm also invests opportunistically in European real estate and ...

for an

enterprise value Enterprise value (EV), total enterprise value (TEV), or firm value (FV) is an economic measure reflecting the market value of a business (i.e. as distinct from market price). It is a sum of claims by all claimants: creditors (secured and unsecured) ...

of €1.5 billion in April 2017.

Products

GE Wind Turbines

GE onshore wind turbines

The GE platform began development with the creation of the 1.5-megawatt series of wind turbines that were developed with the cooperation of the

United States Department of Energy The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government that oversees U.S. national energy policy and manages the research and development of nuclear power and nuclear weapons in the United States ...

. It consisted of three fibreglass blades attached to a horizontal axis hub. The hub is connected to the main shaft that turns a multi-stage system of gears. The gears increase the rotational rate and send the

kinetic energy In physics, the kinetic energy of an object is the energy that it possesses due to its motion. It is defined as the work needed to accelerate a body of a given mass from rest to its stated velocity. Having gained this energy during its acce ...

obtained from the wind to a doubly-fed electric machine, where it is converted into electrical energy. The angle of the blades and the direction that the turbine faces are controlled by an active, all- electric pitch and yaw system. The generator and gearbox are contained in the

nacelle A nacelle ( ) is a "streamlined body, sized according to what it contains", such as an engine, fuel, or equipment on an aircraft. When attached by a pylon entirely outside the airframe, it is sometimes called a pod, in which case it is attache ...

, which is further insulated to minimize noise emissions. Several optional features support its presence in

electrical grid An electrical grid is an interconnected network for electricity delivery from producers to consumers. Electrical grids vary in size and can cover whole countries or continents. It consists of:Kaplan, S. M. (2009). Smart Grid. Electrical Power ...

s, including voltage regulation,

low voltage ride through In electrical power engineering, fault ride through (FRT), sometimes under-voltage ride through (UVRT), or low voltage ride through (LVRT), is the capability of electric generators to stay connected in short periods of lower electric network volt ...

, and the delivery of

reactive power Reactive may refer to: *Generally, capable of having a reaction (disambiguation) *An adjective abbreviation denoting a bowling ball coverstock made of reactive resin *Reactivity (chemistry) *Reactive mind *Reactive programming See also *Reactanc ...

during grid disturbances or periods of low wind. To further wind power research, a unit was commissioned at the National Wind Technology Center in late 2009. Its 10,000 installations in the US at the time constituted 50% of the national commercial wind energy fleet, influencing the NREL's decision to install a model at the Center. The next evolution, the 2.5XL, used a permanent magnet generator, and its entire output was converted to AC at mains frequency. The platform was then moved back to the use of a doubly-fed generator and rotor converter, similar to the 1.5 series. As of 2017, GE had over 35,000 turbines installed across the globe.

GE offshore wind turbines

The offshore GE 3.6 SL model was installed in 2003 at the

Arklow Bank Wind Park Arklow Bank Wind Park is a 25 megawatt offshore wind farm generating electrical power for the Wicklow region in Ireland. It is the first offshore wind farm in Ireland, and the world's first erection of wind turbines rated over 3 MW. I ...

. In the early 2010s GE cancelled its development of a 4.1-megawatt offshore wind turbine. The only example built, owned by Goteborg Energi, was erected in Goteborg in 2011. Following the purchase of the Ecotècnia by Alstom and the acquisition of Alstom by General Electric, production started in 2016 at the St. Nazaire factory for the 6-megawatt Haliade offshore turbine, featuring a permanent magnet design. This unit started an extended test period in Spring 2016 at

Østerild Wind Turbine Test Field Østerild Wind Turbine Test Field (alternatively Risø) is a facility managed by the DTU Risø Campus of the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) for testing of offshore wind turbines with a pinnacle height up to near Thisted-Østerild, Denmar ...

The Haliade-X was certified for typhoons in 2021. using a prototype in Rotterdam. GE and Hyundai agreed to build a Haliade-X factory in South Korea.

Key projects

The 845-megawatt Shepherds Flat Wind Farm in

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

is the first windpark in the United States to utilize permanent magnet design in its primary wind turbine.

Fântânele-Cogealac Wind Farm The Fântânele-Cogealac Wind Farm is the largest onshore wind farm in Romania and in Europe, with installed nameplate capacity of 600 MW from 240 General Electric 2.5xl wind turbines. The wind farm has been built for the ČEZ Group. Hist ...

in Romania, constructed in 2008, uses 240 GE 2.5xl wind turbines capable of generating a total of 600 MW, powering a million Romanian households each year. The offshore GE 3.6 SL model was installed at the

. Through the provision of 179 GE 3.6-137 turbines to

Markbygden Wind Farm The Markbygden Wind Farm is a series of interconnected wind farms in the Markbygden area west of Piteå, Norrbotten county in northern Sweden. The project is expected to be completed by 2025 and might have a capacity of up to 4,000 megawatts (MW) ...

in Sweden, GE will create the largest single onshore wind installation in Europe. Norsk Hydro will purchase the power via a 19-year fixed volume corporate PPA; understood to be the largest corporate wind energy PPA in the world. In April 2018, General Electric announced that it will begin testing the world's largest wind turbine the Haliade-X at its facilities in Blyth, England. General Electric's

renewable energy Renewable energy is energy that is collected from renewable resources that are naturally replenished on a human timescale. It includes sources such as sunlight, wind, the movement of water, and geothermal heat. Although most renewable energy ...

department signed a five-year contract with the British government-funded Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE)

Catapult A catapult is a ballistic device used to launch a projectile a great distance without the aid of gunpowder or other propellants – particularly various types of ancient and medieval siege engines. A catapult uses the sudden release of stor ...

to begin trials of the 12-megawatt turbine. A prototype was installed at

Port of Rotterdam The Port of Rotterdam is the largest seaport in Europe, and the world's largest seaport outside of East Asia, located in and near the city of Rotterdam, in the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. From 1962 until 2004, it was the worl ...

, producing 288 MWh in 24 hours in February 2020, and a 14 MW prototype started there in October 2021. Plans in September 2020 called for a new upgraded version of 13 MW GE Haliade-X turbine to be installed at Dogger Bank Wind Farm by 2023, and DNV-certified in late 2022.

References

External links

* * {{Wind power in the United States Companies based in Fairfield County, Connecticut General Electric Wind turbine manufacturers Wind power in the United States