Spanish wind turbines manufacturer and onshore and offshore wind services provider Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy has signed a four-year operations and maintenance (O&M) agreement with Pattern Energy for the 218MW Panhandle Wind 1 facility.
Located in the Texas Panhandle in Carson County, Texas, the Panhandle Wind 1 facility comprises 118 units of 1.85-87MW GE wind turbines. The company plans to start servicing the turbines later this year.
Siemens Gamesa said that the facility has started commercial operations in July 2014 and Pattern Energy acquired the ownership interest for 172MW from Pattern Development after the commercial operations began.
In addition, approximately 77% of the expected output of Panhandle 1 has been contracted under a 13-year energy price hedge, with an A-/Baa2 credit-rated affiliate of Citibank, and the rest sold at ERCOT’s spot market prices.
Pattern Energy operations senior vice-president Kevin Devlin said: “Siemens Gamesa is a strong service provider and we count on them to optimize performance and to realize the full value of our wind turbine fleet.”
The deal features a service and maintenance agreement that offers better flexibility to boost energy asset returns
Siemens Gamesa said that it is able to improve the performance and reliability of the GE technology by leveraging its technical experience and capabilities for servicing turbines of other manufacturers.
As part of the agreement, the company intends to implement a full range of value-added analytics at the facility, including NEM Solutions and SCADA Diagnostics.
Siemens Gamesa Americas region service CEO Darnell Walker said: “With Pattern Energy’s high expectations of service providers, we are proud to support them in solving complex challenges with the assurance of maximizing project profitability and output. This agreement allows Pattern Energy to realize the best possible return on investment for their Panhandle Wind 1 fleet.”
Siemens Gamesa claims that since 2010, it has been maintaining wind turbines from other manufacturers, and the new agreement increases its total multi-brand turbine servicing portfolio to more than 1GW.
