Vitol has granted a $70 million balance of plant contract to a subsidiary of US contractor Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives (IEA) for the 240 MW Big Sky wind farm repowering in the US state of Illinois. The repowering of the Big Sky wind farm in Bureau and Lee Counties will begin in August 2021 and is scheduled to be finished in July 2022. The IEA will self-perform all of the project’s engineering, procurement, and construction needs, including full decommissioning and foundation removal of five old turbines and repowering of 109 machines, which will include the replacement of nacelles, hubs, blades, and adapter rings.
IEA is one of the major utility-scale wind farm contractors in North America, having completed more than 20 GW of wind power projects. Vitol, on the other hand is a commodity trading company and is also known as one of the largest independent energy traders in the world. The company also ships about 350 million tonnes of crude oil per year and owns and operates 250 supertankers and other vessels that transport it across the world.
The companies expect that as the wind energy industry grows and turbine technology improves, repowering projects will become more prevalent since it is a fantastic method to enhance sustainable energy output without having to build a new farm from the ground up. The project is expected to increase the wind farm’s yearly production by roughly 60%.
