Hyundai-led group set to win wind farm order from Pakistan

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SEOUL, Jan. 21 (Yonhap) -- A South Korean consortium led by Hyundai Heavy
Industries Co., the world's leading shipbuilder, is set to sign a deal to build a
wind farm in southwestern Pakistan, a trade promotion body said Thursday.
The deal is estimated to fetch about 80 billion won (US$70.3 million) and calls
for the consortium to complete the 50-megawatt wind-power farm by mid 2011, the
Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) said.
Under the deal to be signed next Monday in Seoul with Yunus Brothers Group, one
of Pakistan's largest export houses, the consortium will provide 30 wind power
generators of 1.65 megawatts each starting by the end of 2010 for the
construction of the wind farm.
The consortium consists of four South Korean companies -- Hyundai Heavy
Industries, Korea Southern Power Co., a unit of the state-run Korea Electric
Power Corp., Hyundai Engineering Co., an industrial plant builder, and Hyundai
Corp., a trading firm.
The consortium holds a 49 percent stake in the project, which includes Hyundai
Heavy Industries' 35 percent stake, while Yunus Brothers owns the rest.
The planned wind farm is part of a project launched by the Pakistani government
in 2006 to build a total of 818 50-megawatt wind farms across the country's seven
provincial and administrative regions.
The South Asian country has been operating a 6-megawatt wind farm since April of
last year, though its wind power generation system is still in its infancy, KOTRA
said.
In September 2008, Hyundai Heavy Industries said that it will invest 102 billion
won in a plant that makes wind power generators by February 2010. The shipbuilder
won an order in September of 2009 to provide six 1.65-megawatt wind turbine
generators to U.S.-based Wave Wind LLC. by March 2010.
South Korean shipbuilders including Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co,
the world's third-largest shipbuilder, have tapped into the wind power business
to secure new growth sources and combat a sharp fall in new orders for ships
caused by the global economic crisis sparked in late 2008.
jia@yna.co.kr
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