English
Français
Last Friday, the Vanuatu archipelago, which is made up of 80 islands and has a population of 270,000 people, was hit by Cyclone Pam, a category 5 storm with gusts exceeding 320 km/h.
Although, little is known as yet about the full scope of destruction and resulting needs of the island nation, Vergnet found no damage to our thirteen wind turbines installed in the area. The GEV MP medium-power wind turbine that is used on Vanuatu was specifically designed by Vergnet to withstand hurricanes by lowering its blades to the ground.
We have been installing projects in extreme weather conditions since 1992 and now have over 900 wind turbines installed around the world. Vergnet wind turbines are specifically designed for distributed generation in markets such as Europe and the USA, as well as in isolated areas in Australia and Africa through to hurricane areas including Japan, the Caribbean and New Caledonia.
The 13 wind turbines, which were designed to suit challenging and climatic – conditions, like those in Vanuatu, are ready to be reconnected once the electrical infrastructure has been re-established.
Vergnet’s technical team are currently on site helping to restore the national electrical grid and telecommunications network, which has been designated a priority task by the United Nations. The engineering team are working closely with Telecoms Without Borders, a non-governmental organisation, to restore this as rapidly as possible.
For more information please click here.