Texas Midwest Fuels Up Industry to Support Alternative Energy
Published Feb 19, 2009
Sections of a wind turbine tower are on the move.
Five years ago, when Nick Nixon and Jeff Flood decided to move their small Minnesota concrete company to Texas and target the wind-farm market, folks thought them, well, a bit misguided.
Nearly 2,000 turbine bases later, Concrete Mobility’s plan seems far from it. The company set up shop in Colorado City, bought 230 acres to provide rock and sand for its product, and began sending its six mobile “batch plants” to U.S. and Mexican wind sites.
“We set out to be the No.1 producer of concrete for wind farms,” says Nixon, one of the company’s directors. “Business is good.”
Business is especially booming in Texas, the country’s largest producer of wind energy. The Texas Midwest is home to massive wind farms, and companies such as Concrete Mobility are moving in to support an industry that shows no signs of slowing.
The region has ambitious plans not only to be a generation source of alternate energy, such as wind and solar, but a manufacturing and service hub, as well.
Tower Tech Systems Inc. finished the first phase of a new wind-tower manufacturing plant early in 2009.
“With Tower Tech, we are talking about a $27 million investment and 150 jobs, 70 percent of them paying between $40,000 and $50,000,” says Gary Robinett, director of marketing and industrial recruitment for the Abilene Industrial Foundation. “It is bringing real manufacturing jobs here and capital investment.”
Alison Wroblewski, Tower Tech vice president of sales and marketing, says the region’s workforce and proximity to interstates and rail lines helped solidify the company’s location.
“Abilene is the heart of wind for Texas,” she says.
Tower Tech, a subsidiary of Broadwind Energy Inc., will make enough large-scale, tubular wind towers in 2009 to produce 300 megawatts of power.
The company has a larger plant in Wisconsin, yet Wroblewski says the potential for growth in the Texas Midwest is significant.
Energy Maintenance Services LLC and Badger Transport Inc., two other Broadwind companies, have regional operations that support the wind industry’s specialized needs. Barr Fabrication LLC in Brownwood makes large towers and tower components.
Florida Power & Light Co., primary owner of Horse Hollow, the world’s largest wind farm, has opened an office in Abilene that works with landowners on deeds and contracts for tower placement, Robinett says. GE Wind Energy Services has operations in Sweetwater.
“There is a huge need for people to enter this industry,” Robinett says.
The Abilene Industrial Foundation is gearing up to offer a four-week certification program in concert with Global Energy Services.
“This will give the basics in safety and basics in tower design and maintenance, and make people more hirable,” Robinett says.
When manufacturers said they needed welders, the foundation put together a five-week program that won a Texas workforce award.
“Ninety-plus people went through,” Robinett says. “All of them got hired.”
Story by Pamela Coyle
Photo by J. Kyle Keener
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