Copyright 2003 Asia Pulse Pte Limited
Asia Pulse

November 11, 2003 Tuesday

SECTION: Northern Territory Regional

LENGTH: 203 words

HEADLINE: GE WIND ENERGY FOCUSING ON LARGE WIND TURBINES

DATELINE: TOKYO, Nov 11

BODY:
General Electric Corp. is developing ever-larger wind turbines, which it
intends to market primarily in Europe starting next year.

But some of these giant windmills may eventually find their way to Japan.

GE Wind Energy President Steve Zwolinski said the company plans to market
three new types of power-generating wind turbines with capacities of 2.3mw,
2 .5mw and 2.7mw. These giant windmills are made mainly for offshore use,
which is the general trend in European countries such as Germany, Spain and
the U.K . It costs 400-500 million yen to build one windmill.

GE Wind Energy has developed a unit as large as 3.6mw and has built a
prototype for evaluation in Spain. The company has also won an order in
Ireland to set up a plant with seven large turbines for a combined output of
25.2mw.

In Japan, mountaintop locations are more common sites for wind farms, with
most turbines generating around 1.5mw. For the time being, GE Wind Energy
will market primarily turbines of that class in Japan either directly or
together with its partner, Japan Wind Development Co.

Zwolinski said the 1.5mw machines are the core of the market and are likely
to remain so for the next five years.

(Nikkei)u

LOAD-DATE: November 11, 2003