Te Uku makes the most of Waikato's wind

The Waikato’s first wind farm goes ‘live’ today when Prime Minister John Key formally switches on the turbines at the Te Uku wind farm.

The wind farm, of 28 Siemens turbines, is a joint alliance between Meridian Energy and WEL Networks. It is the first generation development project of its type in New Zealand between an electricity generator and retailer and a lines company.

Meridian Chief Executive Tim Lusk says it’s a proud day for the company. “This is a celebration of the efforts of our business partners, tangata whenua and the community working closely together to showcase a world class wind farm to the country,” he says.

“This wind farm is going to be one of the most productive in the world. Wind patterns at Te Uku mean that we will get twice the energy out of the turbines compared to that of the average wind farms elsewhere in the world.”

The wind farm has been generating electricity since November last year when the first turbine went live ahead of schedule. So far 22 turbines have been installed and 17 are producing electricity. All 28 turbines are expected to be operating by early March, with a capacity of 64.4MWs, enough to power 30,000 average homes.

“Te Uku will make a significant contribution to securing electricity supply in the Waikato. It will play an important role in providing energy into the national grid when electricity demand in the Waikato is low. In turn this will increase the security of supply not only for the Waikato region but the whole country.”
WEL Networks secured resource consent to build the wind farm in 2008. In 2009 WEL Networks and Meridian Energy entered into an alliance whereby Meridian would build and operate the wind farm while WEL would build and operate the electricity distribution line connecting the wind farm to the local network.

WEL Chief Executive Julian Elder says “this is a great demonstration of our commitment to leadership in driving community, regional and national benefits. Our staff, partners, iwi and the community have worked well together to achieve the best possible outcome for a project of this nature.”

Tim Lusk says the project team had to overcome many challenges during construction of the wind farm, including dealing with the site’s very steep terrain, which in places reaches heights of over 400 metres above sea level.

“They built 26kms of roads to transport the turbines to their foundations and built and maintained over 180 ‘erosion and sediment controls’ during the project. All of their hard work was recognised when they won Environment Waikato’s inaugural ‘site of the year’ award last year. I want to acknowledge the competence and professionalism of all our contractors and partners who have helped ensure that we reached today’s milestone.”
Important facts about the Te Uku wind farm

Once all 28 Siemens turbines are generating at Te Uku, Meridian’s total wind capacity will be increased by 19 percent taking it to 353MWs. New Zealand’s total wind generation capacity will be 570MW.

Te Uku will increase Meridian’s total (wind and hydro) installed generation by two percent to a total of 2,806MW.

At maximum capacity, one turbine can generate up to 2.3MW of electricity, enough to power all the homes within the town of Raglan.

Te Uku has a capacity factor of 44 percent, which is twice the average capacity factor of about 23 percent for wind farms internationally.

Te Uku wind farm will supply electricity to the local WEL Network.

Over 50 percent of the people working on the construction of the wind farm are locals who worked alongside experts from Denmark and Australia.

In addition to the construction of 26km of roads, 70km of cables have been laid throughout the wind farm to connect all 28 turbines to the new on-site switching station. All electricity will flow out via two circuits on a new 33kV, 25km distribution line built by WEL Networks.

WEL Network’s new line build, completed in October 2010, was the largest construction project undertaken by a lines company last year. The transmission line build plays an important part in WEL’s Western Network Upgrade, which when completed will increase security of supply for the region.

The project has brought significant financial benefits to the region, with over $30 million being invested in the local economy through employment, accommodation for people coming from outside the area, and retail spending.

The first turbine went live on 13 November 2010.

40,000 native plants have been planted on site.

Technical data on Siemens wind turbines at Te Uku wind farm:
IEC Class: IIB

Rotor diameter: 101 metres

Blade Length: 49 metres

Swept area: 8000 m2

Hub height: 80 metres

Power regulation: pitch regulated

Blade weight: 10.9 tonnes

Rotor weight: 50.9 tonnes

Nacelle weight: 81 tonnes

80 m tower weight (IEC IIB): 168.6 tonnes

Cut-in wind speed: 4 metres/second

Nominal power: 12-13 metres/second

Cut-out wind speed: 25 metres/second

The blade is manufactured in a single operation, using a patented manufacturing process invented by Siemens, based on vacuum-assisted resin injection project without adhesives.

The blades have no glue joints between spars and shells, no weak points, no easy access for water or lightning.

Siemens supply 160 foundation bolts at 1475mm in length with a diameter of 42mm.

Siemens provide a template to ensure the tower matches the foundation.

The bottom tower diameter is 4.2m.

Each turbine foundation contains 1000 tonnes of concrete (400 cubic metres, or 80-100 truckloads) and 45 tonnes of steel

About Meridian Energy

Meridian is New Zealand’s largest electricity generator and currently owns and operates nine hydro stations and three wind farms within New Zealand, and one wind farm in Australia:

• Manapouri power station and eight hydro stations on the Waitaki River in the South Island
• Te Apiti wind farm near Palmerston North
• White Hill wind farm in Southland
• West Wind farm in Wellington
• Mt Millar wind farm, Eyre Peninsula, South Australia
• CalRENEW 1 solar farm in Mendota, California

Internationally, Meridian has operations in Sydney, Australia, and San Francisco, California. Meridian recently announced the establishment of a joint venture with Australian energy company AGL to build what will be the southern hemisphere's biggest wind farm in southwest Victoria. The 420MW Macarthur wind farm is due for completion in 2013.

Meridian has a total retail customer base of 203,271 customers throughout New Zealand, which includes households, farms and businesses. It also provides electricity to New Zealand’s single largest electricity user, the Rio Tinto Alcan New Zealand Limited aluminium smelter in Bluff.

Meridian invests strongly in renewable energy development both in New Zealand and offshore.

About WEL Networks

WEL Networks is a provider of electricity distribution services to the Waikato region. It is owned by a community trust, WEL Energy Trust.

WEL Networks owns, develops and maintains the electricity network of lines, cables, substations and associated infrastructure. The WEL Networks distribution system connects 80,000 customers to the national grid and generation facilities.