Wind power maintenance market grows in Europe
While the wind energy market is growing at a tremendous rate, the service market is struggling to keep pace, according to research by Frost and Sullivan.
The continued growth of the wind energy sector across Europe is contributing to the strong growth of the European wind services market.
Operation and maintenance (OandM) of wind projects, which was ignored in the past, is now being looked at more seriously due to increasing installed capacity and high costs.
New analysis from Frost and Sullivan "European Wind Service Markets - Trends and Opportunities", finds that the market earned revenues of Eur1.58 billion in 2007 and estimates this to reach Eur4.54 billion in 2014.
"The total installed wind capacity in Europe is increasing at 20% per annum", notes Frost and Sullivan Research Analyst Gouri Nambudripad.
"Frost and Sullivan estimates that Europe has installed 55GW of wind energy projects by 2007, representing 65% of the global capacity".
While the wind energy market is growing at a tremendous rate, the service market is struggling to keep pace.
Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are finding it hard to maintain service levels, leaving the door open for independent service providers (ISPs) and project developers, who are now forced to think of opening their own divisions to focus on OandM.
A trend involving ISPs working for wind turbine manufacturers is already developing, as wind turbine manufacturers are sub-contracting service and maintenance work to ISPs.
However, the traditional participants in the wind services market, the wind turbine manufacturers, are slowly facing competition from new entrants, the ISPs and in-house divisions of customers such as utilities.
The entry of ISPs in the past few years has put the spotlight on price.
"In more established markets such as Germany, ISPs are beginning to undercut OEMs with comprehensive packages and reduced prices", says Nambudripad.
"Customers feel that the servicing prices charged by the OEMs are excessive, sometimes 25-30% of total costs of the wind farm".
"Going forward, turbine manufacturers need to heighten their focus on providing quality service by hiring, training and retaining more qualified staff".
"They also need to look at a range of service packages to keep their clients happy".
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