Higher hub heights for wind energy in North America

Many wind turbines in the United States consist of a steel tower with an average hub height of less than 100 meters. Yet higher wind turbines are proven to produce higher yields. Max Bögl Wind AG is the market leader for hub heights above 130 meters and recently built the worlds tallest wind turbine with a hub height of 178 meters. At AWEA WINDPOWER 2018 on May 7-10 in Chicago, the company will present its Hybrid Tower system at booth 2340 and showcase its current activities in the North American market.

The Hybrid Towers of Max Bögl Wind AG offer an amazing advantage - an efficient combination of concrete and steel that allows for the cost-effective implementation of hub heights of up to 180 meters. Less wind turbulence and thus significantly better wind yield means that each additional meter of hub height increases the annual energy yield of the turbine by 0.5 to 1 percent. This ensures a faster ROI for the entire project.

Knowledge transfer from Germany to the US

Max Bögl Wind AG has been deploying its modular Hybrid Tower system in Germany with great success over the years and is now the market leader for hub heights above 130 meters. The worlds tallest wind turbine - with a hub height of 178 meters - began operating near Stuttgart at the end of last year. The family company from Bavaria believes that Hybrid Towers can be huge success in the North American market as well. Ever rising steel prices make it difficult to accurately calculate the costs for steel tower turbines. Concrete prices, on the other hand, are very stable and make cost calculations for Hybrid Towers much more reliable. The Hybrid Towers of Max Bögl Wind AG are constructed in mobile factories using local workers and local resources. This ensures added value on the local level.

The benefits of combining steel and concrete

The secret to achieving such great heights lies in the unique combination of precast concrete parts and steel elements. The concrete component is completely maintenance-free and especially durable. Consisting of a rigid concrete tower section and a more flexible steel tip, Hybrid Tower systems also offer better static and dynamic response behavior and higher fatigue strength and longevity than pure concrete or steel towers. The modular design and simple "stacking" of rings allow fast construction of the concrete tower within a week, and this under any weather conditions.
 
Water battery as natural power storage facility

With the water battery, Max Bögl Wind AG has also developed a completely new large-scale storage facility, which sets new standards in a technologically innovative way. For the first time ever, power generation from renewable energies such as wind, solar or biomass is combined with a modern pumped-storage power plant. The water battery can store surplus power from the grid and then release it when needed. The tower foundations of wind turbines can also serve as storage reservoirs that are located higher than the pumped storage power plant and the lower reservoir.
About Max Bögl Wind AG
Using renewable energies more efficiently and actively promoting the energy transition. This is the principle behind Max Bögl Wind AG with its innovative technology solutions. The company is the market leader in Germany for the manufacture, delivery and erection of Hybrid Towers for hub heights of 130 meters and above, and holds the record for the highest wind turbine tower with a hub height of 178 meters. Max Bögl Wind AG is also setting new innovative standards in the energy storage industry. With the water battery, an entirely new type of flexible and small pumped-storage power plant has been developed which combines renewable energies with large-scale storage facilities for the first time. Max Bögl Wind AG is an affiliate company of Max Bögl. The corporate group from Sengenthal near Neumarkt in Bavaria is one of the top 10 largest German companies in the construction industry, and has been operating in the wind sector since 2010. Founded in 1929, the family-owned company with around 6,500 employees worldwide has an annual turnover of over 1.7 billion euros.