Vestas has signed with FRI-EL Green Power S.p.A. 15-year service contractsfor four wind power plants in Italy for a total capacity of 192 MW, including 110 units of V90-3.0 MW, V90-2.0 MW and V52-850 kW wind turbines.
The four wind power plants produce approximately 350,000 MWh per year, which is enough to meet the residential electricity consumption of more than 307,000 people in Italy and save the environment from about 135,000 tons of CO2 emissions on an annual basis. Installed between 2006 and 2008, the power plants are located in the regions of Campania, Apulia, Sardinia and Basilicata.
The contracts include a 15-year service agreement with Vestas’ latest Active Output Management (AOM) 5000 service option. Consisting of scheduled and unscheduled maintenance, the AOM 5000 introduces an energy-based guarantee, which ensures the turbines are fully operational when the wind is blowing. Thus, Vestas guarantees the customer an energy-based availability through a challenging capture ratio of the available wind energy for each site covered minimising the wind power plants’ lost production.
FRI-EL Green Power will also benefit from an enhanced engineering package which comprises solutions for blade and gearbox boroscopic inspections as well as the Vestas Turbine Monitoring solution to help the customer understand better the turbine performance and to analyse any fault conditions.
Through these service agreements, the customer will also benefit from the Vestas Weather & Power Forecast, a high-quality, site specific, continuous weather and production forecasting system. It enables the optimisation of maintenance schedules by identifying low wind periods during which service is to be performed. It also improves customers' business by delivering precise power forecasting, and it fulfils the grid requirements established.
The contracts have been signed by four special purpose companies owned by FRI-EL Green Power. The latter is highly specialised in the production and sale of energy from renewable sources. As of today, the company has a total generating capacity of 471 MW with wind representing the predominant energy source followed by biomass and biogas.
“The renewal of these four advanced service contracts, taking place after the recent signature of the Gorgoglione contract for the first V112 wind power plant in Italy, is yet another sign of our solid partnership with Vestas. It also demonstrates our will to continue to have Vestas as the only service provider for 110 turbines for the next 15 years. We decided to award Vestas these contracts, as we have full confidence in Vestas’ service capabilities,” states Josef Gostner, Vice President and CEO, FRI-EL Green Power.
“We are honoured by FRI-EL Green Power’s loyalty towards Vestas,” comments Juan Araluce, Acting President, Vestas Mediterranean and Chief Sales Officer, Vestas Wind Systems A/S, who continues, “We are ready to deliver at our best to consolidate even more this long lasting partnership. Vestas’ predictive and corrective systems combined with an integrated network of online tools and systems monitoring more than 22,000 turbines worldwide and qualified local service teams allow us to offer our customers comprehensive service and maintenance for a higher energy output.”
With the accomplishment of this agreement, during 2012, Vestas in Italy has secured long term service contracts for around 1 GW and more than 70 per cent of these related to the already installed fleet.
