Developer Orsted has completed construction of the 338MW Sage Draw project in Texas, its largest onshore wind farm to-date.
Switch-on of Sage Draw, build by contractor Blattner Energy with 120 GE turbines, brings the Danish utility’s installed capacity on land in the country to 1.3GW, with another 800MW of onshore, solar and storage projects under construction and due to enter operations “late this year or early next”.
Orsted during the past years had become the world’s largest operator of offshore wind, and only two years ago decided to go back into the onshore wind business.
The company in 2013 (then still with the name Dong Energy) had announced it would exit wind on land to concentrate on its offshore plans, and by the end of the following year had sold its Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and Polish onshore wind assets.
In yet another strategic shift, the utility roared back into onshore wind in 2018, a move it cemented with the acquisition of US outfit Lincoln Clean Energy (LCE) in the same year.
“The safe completion of Sage Draw amidst the escalating Covid-19 crisis is a testament to the resilience and adaptiveness of the Orsted team and key project partners at Blattner Energy and GE Renewable Energy, as well as financial partners GE Energy Financial Services and BHE Renewables,” said Orsted onshore wind CEO Declan Flanagan, LCE’s former chief executive.
“This underscores the significant role renewable energy can play in continuing to build our economy as we manage through and beyond the current crisis."
Orsted targets reaching 5GW in installed onshore wind capacity by 2025.
