Turbine supply bottleneck hits 57 MW Fosen plant

A 57.5 MW wind plant is going up in the wind-swept mountains in Norway's far north to provide over half the electricity needed in the sparsely populated Fosen region. So far just 12 of the planned 25 Enercon 2.3 MW turbines have been installed at TrønderEnergi's Bessakerfjellet project, with the remaining units not expected until next year. Completion of the project has not been stalled by oncoming winter, but by turbine supply bottlenecks, says Trønder's Ole Frostad. The company now expects full completion by October 2008. The project has a NOK 100 million (EUR 13 million) grant from ENOVA, Norway's renewables agency, under a now defunct capital subsidy program, making it ineligible for the NOK 0.08/kWh (EUR 0.01/kWh) subsidy Norwegian wind producers can get from January 2008. Once online, Bessakerfjellet will provide around 10% of Trønder's total annual electricity production. The company has two other wind projects, both in the northern half of the country. The 9.2 MW Valsneset project came online last year, while its 200 MW Frøya project, being developed in partnership with NordTrøndelag Energi, is still awaiting building approval from Norway's Water and Energy Directorate. A decision on approval will not be made before June 2008, Frostad says.