Vattenfall’s new CEO Magnus Hall visited the company’s wind centre in Esbjerg, Denmark on Monday. Hall came to Esbjerg as the company is about to break the barrier of 1000 wind turbines to be controlled from its surveillance centre at the Danish North Sea coast.
The Esbjerg office has been part of the Vattenfall’s wind development since 2006 and is important for the expansion of offshore as well as onshore wind due to the versatile competences gathered under one roof. Esbjerg houses one of the largest wind turbine surveillance centres in Europe and monitors wind turbines in Denmark, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK on a 24/7 basis. The office is overseeing all Vattenfall’s wind farms including the new offshore wind farm DanTysk which will be connected to the grid soon.
In Esbjerg, Magnus Hall met wind employees from the Danish Esbjerg and Fredericia offices. “Renewables will be Vattenfall’s core business,” Hall said at the meeting. Asked about the future of Vattenfall’s Danish operations, he said: “With wind going to be a central part of Vattenfall’s business in the future, it makes a lot of sense to me that Denmark will continue to be a central place for wind – also because that is where the competence is”.
Magnus Hall ended the day with a helicopter ride to Horns Rev 1 and DanTysk and a close look at the Tjæreborg onshore wind farm near Esbjerg.