On 2 and 3 October, the annual wind power trade fair was held in Paris. This was 14th time the trade fair had been held, and it is France’s largest trade fair dedicated to wind power. It is still rather small compared to the German trade fairs, with roughly 3,000 visitors, but it is constantly growing. The comparatively small size is also reflected in the market structure.
While the plans for wind power expansion in the coming years extend up to 7 GW per year in Germany, we expect to see roughly 2 GW a year in France. "This was the third time that we participated in the trade fair as an exhibitor with our subsidiary, BWTS France. In the French market, we have been able to build up a very broad customer portfolio," explains Michael Richter (Managing Director, BWTS GmbH).
In addition to leading customers, such as Nordex, Enercon and Deutsche Windtechnik, operators such as Engie, Boralex, RES and EDF are returning customers with ongoing contracts.
"We currently employ 16 technicians in France and want to go beyond 20 in the coming years. As in previous years, we exhibited jointly with a partner. This year our partner was Bioseco from Poland, a company that supplies systems for reducing bird strikes on wind turbines in Poland, Germany, France and Spain and that is now the market leader in this area. In France, these types of systems are mandatory for most new turbines and BWTS France installs and maintains these systems," explains Jean-Luc Coulon (Managing Director, BWTS SAS France).
