Wind

Facing strong headwinds in its home market China's wind power manufacturing sector market seems unlikely to find much relief in the United States. Following on from its decision earlier this month to impose steep import tariffs on Chinese-made solar cells, the US Commerce Department (DOC) yesterday announced that it is imposing tariffs as high as 26 percent on utility-scale wind towers made in China. The DOC says that after an investigation, it found Chinese producers and exporters of towers used to support actual wind turbines with more than a 100-kW power rating were receiving state subsidies between 13.74 and 26 percent.

Chinese turbine maker Ming Yang says first quarter revenues will fall 70 percent on last year after growth in the world’s largest wind market slows.

Construction of the 500-MW Mekong Delta Wind Power Centre in Vietnam’s Bac Lieu city is now underway with completion expected in 2015.

Encouraged by the initial results of a 4.5-MW wind power project in Gujarat, GAIL (India) is making further moves into India’s renewables sector with 100-MW worth of wind projects in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka and eyeing opportunities in six other states.

Bloomberg reports that Indowind Energy, which sells wind power in India to companies including Oracle and Citibank, seeks to raise USD30 million to help pay off loans and bondholders.

Malaysia’s Timar Wind Solar Energy Sdn Bhd plans to invest USD800 million in developing the wind power manufacturing facilities in Vietnam’s Ninh Thuan province, having just signed an MOU to that effect with the provincial authorities.

Sembcorp Utilities, a wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore’s SGX-listed Sembcorp Industries has signed a transaction with the New York-listed AES Corp to acquire part of its power asset portfolio in China for S$106.7 million (USD85.5 million), according to a company press release yesterday.

RenewableUK, the trade and professional body representing the wind, wave and tidal energy industries, on Friday signed a landmark Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Korean Wind Energy Association.

Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry expects the country's installed renewable energy capacity to rise 13 per cent by March 2013, stimulated by the introduction of a new feed-in tariff (FiT) system starting in July.