China drives down wind turbine prices

The Chinese government is throwing its weight behind a push for alternative energy sources. Among those is wind. One global outcome of this is that wind turbine prices are falling.

Last month, authorities gave a massive kick-start to wind energy by raising the target for the overall share of renewable energy in the nation's power mix to 15 percent by 2020, up from 10 percent.

A significant chunk of that will come from wind farms. And as Chinese firms move in a big way to produce cheap wind turbines to satisfy domestic demand, they're forcing turbine prices down in other countries.

"With the development of wind turbine technology in China, the price is already falling worldwide. The price has come down about 20 percent," said Deng Yuanchang, deputy director of the Wind Resource Research Center at Sun Yat-sen University...

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Comments

[Steve Spence]

And in many parts of the world, the anti-wind folks are try to shutdown wind projects. Having a wind gen and solar panels may be the difference between the haves and the have nots at some point.

[Sustainable14]

Unfortunately, actual turbine prices that we are seing in the U.S. are 20-50% _higher_ this year than they were previously, as a result of short term demand for wind turbines far outstripping supply. Because manufacturers face uncertainty about the Production Tax Credit (PTC), they underinvest in production capacity because they don't know if there is going to be a PTC in a few years. So when the PTC is in place (now until the end of 2006), there is a large demand to get projects scheduled and only a limited amount of turbines. This boom and bust cycle is often quoted as one of the reasons that turbine prices haven't fallen quicker. However, with a high natural gas price as we are seeing now, wind still competes well.

[Anton]

Renewable will be forced on us by Nature. You may also want to check out this site.

http://www.theviewfromthepeak.com

[heiba dieng]

need information about prices of solar panel

[Kerry beauchr]

The article was incorrect in its statements that wind turbine prices are coming down, when in fact they are going up because of higher demand recently. The turbines produced by the Chinese are of now obsolete models that can't be sold
to developed countries. The article was mostly inaccurate.

[James Ye]

Exmok Windpower Co. is the China's leading supplier of small wind generator. Our mission is to demonstrate that green energy is genuinely viable, whether you are living on or off grid - and that renewable energy can be a sound financial investment, as well as a sound investment in our future.

[Wind Turbine]

Wow, now maybe they can actually put some of those turbines to use, and stop crapping all over the environment over there.