As Wind Power Sector Grows, Turbine Makers Feel the Squeeze<br />On Thursday, Vestas, the world’s largest maker of wind turbines, said its revenue in the third quarter<br />fell 6 percent compared with the same period a year ago, to 2.7 billion euros, or $3.1 billion.<br />The Vestas results came just days after Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy — the recently formed company combining the wind-power units of Siemens, the German conglomerate,<br />and Gamesa of Spain — reported a €147 million loss for the third quarter.<br />Such auctions have helped lower by 15 percent the costs per unit of electricity generated by onshore wind projects set to come online over the next five years,<br />and by a third for offshore wind projects in the same period, according to the International Energy Agency, an organization based in Paris.<br />Vestas, for example, reported a 48 percent rise in orders for the third quarter,<br />a key metric for the company, compared with the same period a year ago.<br />But belt-tightening governments across Europe and North America are phasing out subsidies and tax incentives<br />that had helped the industry grow, squeezing companies like Vestas and Siemens Gamesa in the process.<br />The company received around €800,000 per megawatt, a unit of power capacity, for the orders it booked in the third quarter of the year.
