First wind plant in Shaanxi province

Construction of the first wind plant in Shaanxi province, north China, is underway. Located 350 kilometres north of the provincial capital Xi'an, where the infamous terracotta army of China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, was unearthed, the 48 MW Jingbian wind farm comprises 32, 1.5 MW turbines. It is the first phase of a 150-200 MW development. Shaanxi, while a latecomer to wind development compared with its neighbours, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia and Gansu, should have 5700 MW of wind power online by the end of 2010 given the project pipeline for the province. The CNY 480 million ($68.8 million) first phase is being developed by Luneng Group Company Limited and includes construction of a 110 kV transformer station. It is due online in 2009. Luneng, based in Jinan in Shandong province, was one of the first Chinese companies to get into wind development, installing nine turbines on Changdao Island, Shandong, in 1998. To date, it has more than a dozen projects in and out of Shandong, with four totalling just under 200 MW in Inner Mongolia. The group's main business activities are coal-fired power generation, real estate, logistics and shipping.