Secondhand Wind Turbines

[ol' boy]

Might not be a growth business in Australia... yet!
But its business in Europe.

Yep, what happens to those beasts when they run out of contract or life cycle.... Plants get re-powered with new generation tech and old dinosaurs get sold off to who ever.

I'm not sure what the main market is they go to, but i know a lot of Remote Farmers buy them to power their own needs.
Be a great solution for an Island Community too.
Third World Countries too i guess.

Either way, there is a lot of second hand Turbines on the market these days.
Here are some of the places you can purchase;







Many more if you Google.
This will be the next business, Re-Powering old sites, and Decommissioning work.

I guess the same could be said for older tech Solar panels too, as they get swapped out for new tech panels.

Makes you wonder if you could buy a few old Turbines and sell the power back to a Retailer??
Owner Owned and Operated Power Generation?
EG: 1MW Turbine for $68,000 USD

[gordon_s1942]

One question that comes to mind is WHY are they decommissioning them instead of using them unless they see big maintenance costs looming ?
After seeing shows on Discovery etc regarding the installation of both Sea and Land based Turbines shows you need seriously deep pockets to pay for the dismounting, transport and erection to a new site apart from the land costs and preparing a base for the Turbine to be mounted on.

[ol' boy]

Some are written into Contracts Gordon, 20 years, then decommission and remove.... All included in the Project Price from the outset.
Some are just written down to being worthless, just like any other machinery in business

5 years is lot of Wind Turbine changes, so 10 years or 20 years is huge.
As for the big maintenance costs, that comes from Day1 of a brand new Turbine

Its a dam shame in this Country the ACCC hasn't stepped in to make Energy Retailers buy back our Generated power at the exact cost it is charged to us.

You would have to know your stuff, you could easy buy a Wind Turbine for $100,000, then have it do a Gearbox in the first 12months, costing $800,000 to replace!
Let alone getting manufacturer support and new firmwares to run the turbine.

[gordon_s1942]

I understand its common business practice to do as you describe and plan to replace after a given period of time the same as leasing motor vehicles, furniture and machinery and get rid of them before they either begin having problems or the maintenance costs begin to rise past what they are prepared to pay.

As for technology, no doubt like most things of this nature, they were obsolete the day they began functioning.

[ol' boy]

As for technology, no doubt like most things of this nature, they were obsolete the day they began functioning.

Yep, not quite, but each Model of Turbine will have a few Versions, until a whole new platform is built.
Its all based on "Live" R&D, from the maintenance of current of turbines.
Output also increases as things move ahead.

The old Turbines are complete pigs by todays standards.
Its probably like the Second Hand Commercial Airliner Trade gordon, there are relative bargins out there, but would you?
Or more importantly, would a Bank or Finance Company touch it with a 10 foot pole?

Hence, this interesting Secondhand Market.
Or will it be a case of Solar Panels, where you just wouldn't waste the space installing old tech, when new ones are cheap and output 5 times as much energy.

Australia has one big advantage in this game, we have LOTS of space!
We are not some piss ant tiny Euro country, which has all its "good wind" sites spoken for already.