Country Brazil Commission date 2006 | Status Operational Operator(s) Ventos do Sul Energia | |
 | ||
Official name Parque Eólico de Osório Location Osório, Rio Grande do Sul | ||
Parque e lico de os rio rs os rio wind farm
The Osório wind farm (Parque Eólico de Osório in Portuguese) is a wind farm in Brazil, located near the city of Osório, Rio Grande do Sul.
Contents
The farm covers 13,000 hectares (32,000 acres) divided into three lots (Osório proper, Índios and Sangradouro) separated by nature conservation strips 1-kilometre (0.62 mi) wide. It consists of 75 wind turbines of 2 MW, giving 150 MW of installed capacity and about 51 MW of effective capacity (enough for a city of 240,000 inhabitants). The capacity factor is 34%, slightly above the word's average (30%). At the time of its completion (2007), it was the largest wind farm in Latin America and the second-largest in the world.
The first 25 towers started operating in 2006, and the remaining ones in 2007. Its construction took 15 months and cost approximately US$310 million (670 million reais), that is, about US$2 million per installed MW and $6 million per effective MW. The farm is owned and operated by Ventos do Sul Energia, a company owned by Spanish Enerfin/Enervento of the Elecnor group (90%), German Wobben Windpower, a subsidiary of Enercon (9%), and Brazilian CIP Brasil (1%). The Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) financed 69% of the cost.
Details
The area of the farm was originally part marshland, which required building drainage channels, lowering the water table, levelling and land filling. The farm contains 24 kilometres (15 mi) of service roads.
The 75 towers are laid in a single straight row in the Osório section, and in two rows each in the Índios and Sangradouro sections, with 175 metres (574 ft) spacing between towers. Each tower is 98 metres (322 ft) tall and weighs 810 tons; it was assembled on site from 24 sections in prestressed concrete and a final steel section, all made in Gravataí. Each tower rests on a massive buried base with 430 cubic metres (15,000 cu ft) of concrete and 50 tons of rebar, supported by 32 piles 20–35 metres (66–115 ft) deep and 50 centimetres (20 in) wide.
The wind turbines are over 70 metres (230 ft) in diameter and reach to 140 metres (460 ft) above ground. Their blades, 35 metres (115 ft) long, were manufactured in Sorocaba (SP) by Wobben Windpower.
The gearboxes and generators (Wobben Windpower model E-70/2000 kW) were imported and weigh 100 tons each. The generator can produce up to 2 MW of continuous current at 400 V, which is converted in the windmill itself to alternating current at 60 Hz and 34.5 kV. Buried cables then take the power to the farm's substation, where it is stepped up to 230 kV and sent to the regional power grid through an 8-kilometre (5.0 mi) power line.