“AMSC’s wind power business continues to expand globally, with China serving as our largest market,” said Greg Yurek, founder and chief executive officer of AMSC. “As Sinovel Wind continues its rapid production ramp, we are also working closely with two additional customers in China to help them initiate production of wind turbines in order to meet China’s growing demand for zero-emission, wind generated electricity. We see strong potential to add a fourth Chinese customer this fiscal year and are working with other potential customers to expand our reach into other countries.”
The Global Wind Energy Council estimates that approximately 1,347 MW of wind generated electrical capacity was installed in all of China in 2006 and expects 8,000 MW of additional capacity to be added from 2007 through 2010. Worldwide wind power capacity is expected to more than double from 74 gigawatts (GW) at the end of 2006 to nearly 150 GW by the end of 2010.
AMSC now has wind power customers in Australia, Canada, China, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, the U.K. and the U.S.
“The global wind industry is expected to continue to grow approximately 20 percent annually through 2010 as countries around the world rely increasingly on wind power to help meet their growing demands for renewable sources of electricity,” said Yurek. “We expect to see continued growth in sales of our existing product line for the wind industry and to expand our offerings beyond power electronics going forward.”