A Danish company LJM, recently inaugurated its new manufacturing plant at Oragadam, near Chennai. The company manufactures hydraulic cylinders for wind turbines. LJM will invest Rs 19 crore now, and another Rs 40 crore by 2025. This facility will also be used for exporting hydraulic cylinders.
LJM is yet another company that has joined the growing supply chain ecosystem for wind turbine manufacture. This ecosystem of component manufacturers has been building up rather quietly. This is also happening at a time when fresh wind power capacity in Tamil Nadu is coming down. The state is the birthplace of the Indian wind industry, but in recent years, fresh capacity addition has been declining.
Just take a look at the number of companies that have come up in recent years. RewAir, also a Danish company, will soon open its manufacturing facility at Sriperumbudur, near Chennai. This company will get the inlay fabric for wind blades, cut the fabric to proper size to fit the blades and supply the kits to blade manufacturers.
Cubic ModulSystem, which makes electrical panels, is yet another Danish company that has decided to set-up a unit near Chennai. Investment details are as yet unknown.
The German company, ZF, a well-known name in the gearbox industry, has a plant in Coimbatore, which it is expanding. An Erode-based MSME, Coral Manufacturing, has been contracted by the German wind turbine giant, Enercon, for producing generators—a high-value product and indeed the heart of the wind turbine. This company could soon start producing for other manufacturers also.
Companies like Toolfab and Anand Engineering of Tiruchi are steel fabricators who are also producing towers for wind turbines. Toolfab again, like Coral Manufacturing, is producing for Enercon. The TVS group company, Wheels India, has been manufacturing hi-tech fabricated parts for wind towers for several years. The company started with the Danish wind turbine major, Vestas, as its first customer and is now supplying to practically all turbine manufacturers.
