Wind Power in Spain

Says Elorza, “Wind power is exceeding every expectation. You plan for a growth of 15 percent and the market grows at 30 percent. And Gamesa is growing even more quickly than the market itself, so we are in a very good position.”

The engineering company MTorres, which specializes in aeronautics, has turned its sights to wind turbines as well. In an attempt to reduce the weight of larger machines, the company has developed a new model that operates without a gearbox. “This will improve the endurance of the wind turbine and ease maintenance,” says Emilio Martin, sales director of the MTorres wind division. This technology is also designed to adapt to different grid codes, so the turbines could be used in different countries.

In addition, MTorres is capitalizing on its experience with composite materials, which are often used to reduce weight in planes; turbine blades made from these composites could be much lighter. Finally, the company is exploring whether a small offshore wind turbine could be coupled with a desalination plant to provide fresh water to coastal communities.

Wind Base

The autonomous region of Navarra, home to some of the major Spanish international wind companies, is also at the forefront of renewable-energy implementation and research. The region can at times meet up to 70 percent of its inhabitants’ electricity needs with renewable energy, the largest portion of it coming from wind. Wind turbines dot the low mountains that extend throughout the region, a skyline of gracefully rotating white blades.

Navarra is also home to the Center for Renewable Energy Research (CENER), which opened in 2002 to conduct research and provide testing and services for client companies. (Though it focuses on wind power, CENER also investigates biomass, solar thermal, and photovoltaic power.) Services might include testing blades to assess their field performance, or mapping wind resources and forecasting. Thirty percent of the funding comes from national and local government grants; the rest is raised from services and testing for business clients.

Says CENER director Juan Ormazabal, “We wanted to provide companies the services that they required. And sometimes we moved ahead faster than they themselves did, because if we didn’t put ourselves ahead of their needs, we wouldn’t be able to offer value as a research center.”

In the spirit of anticipating client needs, in early 2008 CENER opened the doors to its new wind research center, the largest facility of its kind in the world. It is equipped to test the performance of machines up to eight megawatts, which are currently on the drawing board.

The massive facilities, located about 30 miles outside the Pamplona headquarters, allow researchers to test blade fatigue, gear-box functions, and grid connections. They can simulate conditions to age the machines the equivalent of 20 years in only six months. The site also includes outdoor space where companies can test full turbine assemblies.

At this facility, Gamesa and Ecotécnia partner in the project Windlider 2015, which aims to analyze blade performance and a variety of components for cutting-edge larger machines. Their goals include cutting the development time for new turbines nearly in half and reducing the energy required to produce them by 30 percent. By 2009 the companies plan to be testing 4.5–megawatt machines.

Companies don’t have on-site facilities to perform this type of testing or assembly, says CENER business manager Jerónimo Camacho. “So they have to go to the wind farms, and that can cause several problems,” he says. “The wind farms are very far, and they’re usually not in a very friendly environment. And you need to set up many components, and you have to wait for the wind. So the tests can take a lot of time.” To help address that problem, CENER is now constructing a 30-megawatt experimental wind farm in Navarra.