Tata Steel Europe has secured a multi-million pound order from German engineering giant Siemens to supply steel plates for building 150 onshore wind turbine towers at the Scunthorpe steel plant in the UK. The order, which is the largest so far for its dedicated wind tower project, would vindicate the company's decision to spend £31.5-million on constructing a new manufacturing plant to produce wind farm structures on the site of its sprawling mothballed plant in Teesside in North Lincolnshire. Tata Steel, 
the world's seventh largest steelmaker, had bagged an order from German steel tube producer Eisenbau Kramer (EBK) last year to increase its product and service offering to the offshore renewable energy sector. Under the supply agreement with EBK, tubes from 400mm diameter upwards would be produced by Tata Steel and EBK from plate manufactured by Tata Steel's plants in Scunthorpe or Dalzell. In August 2010, Corus, which has since changed its name to Tata Steel Europe, had unveiled plans to construct the new manufacturing plant, (See: Corus to set up wind farm components plant at Teesside) immediately after the UK government approved plans to build thousands of wind turbines in the sea over the next 10 years to generate 35 gigawatts of electricity, or around 15 per cent of the UK's energy requirements. Tata Steel had envisaged that the UK would require around 6 million tonnes of steel over the next 10 years to make the foundations and tower structures for offshore wind turbines. Tata Steel Europe, the European steel arm of Tata Steel, will supply 25,000 tonnes of high-quality profiled steel plate to Siemens Wind Power to be delivered between April and September this year. Tata Steel Europe said that Siemens will use the steel to build about 150 onshore wind turbine towers. Tata Steel has already supplied Siemens Wind Power with 6,000 tonnes of steel plates for similar developments in the UK and Europe. Steel plates will be manufactured at Tata Steel's plate mills in Scunthorpe, and Dalzell, in Motherwell, Scotland, before they are cut to size and edge-profiled at the Tata Steel's dedicated wind tower hub in Scunthorpe. Phil Knowles, Tata Steel commercial manager for power generation, said, ''Demand for steel in the renewable energy sector will continue to grow, and we're ideally placed to help our customers tap into this important opportunity. ''This major contract, and our position as Siemens Wind Power's nominated sub-contractor, is a direct result of the investment in our Scunthorpe wind tower hub and a great deal of work from the Tata Steel team,'' he added. Tata Steel Europe has one of the widest steel plate product ranges in the world for renewable energy applications and is used by leading global winf turbine manufacturers. It manufactures steel plate in the UK and Western Europe for many applications, including onshore and offshore wind towers, foundations and other renewable technologies such as wave power and tidal flows.Source: Domain-B
