Vestas Secures 373 MW Supply Order for South Africa Wind Projects

Danish wind turbine manufacturer Vestas has secured a massive 373 MW supply order from independent power producer Red Rocket for the Brandvalley, Rietkloof and Wolf wind parks.

Vestas has said that the wind energy projects will be located in Western Cape and Eastern Cape, South Africa.

The contract includes the supply and installation of 64 V150-4.5 MW wind turbines, 12 V163-4.5 MW wind turbines and five V162-6.2 MW Enventus wind turbines.

Vestas will also service the wind parks through a 15-year Active Output Management 5000 (AOM 5000) agreement.

Red Rocket’s CEO, Matteo Brambilla said, that Red Rocket has been investing and supporting South Africa’s electricity crisis for more than a decade and with a portfolio of more than 1,000 MW of wind, hydro and solar projects. Brambilla added, “The projects will bring a 740-million-rand community investment over 20 years through local social projects. The wind farms will start operating in 2024”.

The order includes the first installations globally of the V163-4.5 MW wind turbine from Vestas’ 4 MW platform. Featuring an 18 percent increase in swept area, the V163-4.5 MW wind turbine has a large rotor-size-to-rating ratio resulting in a higher capacity factor, enabling up to 10 percent higher Annual Energy Production at park level compared to the V150-4.5 MW depending on site-specific conditions.

This increases power output at lower wind speeds significantly and improves predictability and stability in production, optimising the utilisation of the wind park as well as benefitting the energy grid.

“With three different wind turbine variants across platforms this order showcases that we are able to enhance the customer business case through optimising the layout on each wind project site with Vestas’ flexible and diverse product portfolio,” said Vestas Sales & Business Development Senior Director, Malte Meyer.

The commissioning of the project is expected by 2024. Vestas said that it leads the South African wind power market with over 1.3 GW of capacity either installed or under construction.

The company is committed to contribute to South Africa’s new renewable energy targets, which include reaching 17.7 GW of wind capacity by 2030 and increasing the presence of renewables in its energy mix from the current 11 per cent to about 41 per cent by 2030.