Michael Giberson
From the New York Times:
Suzlon has expanded rapidly as global demand for wind energy has taken off. Its sales and earnings tripled in the quarter ended June 30, as the company earned the equivalent of $41.6 million on sales of $202.4 million.
The demand for wind turbines has particularly accelerated in India, where installations rose nearly 48 percent last year, and in China, where they rose 65 percent, although from a lower base. Wind farms are starting to dot the coastline of east-central China and the southern tip of India, as well as scattered mesas and hills across central India and even Inner Mongolia.
The story also provides some insights about the perils and benefits of setting up wind turbines in rural India and the challenges of trying to serve the rapidly growning demand for energy in China.
For those who don’t have electricity, availability 35% of the time is a massive improvement.
It is wonderful that electricity from wind turbines, available ~35% of the time, is competitive with electricity available from conventional sources with 90%+ availability. However, it still takes ~6 wind turbines in carefully chosen diverse locations to provide ~90% availability of the output of a single turbine. Progress is a wonderful thing, but it is not the same as success.