GE Renewable Energy is recruiting more than 200 new employees at its LM Wind Power turbine blade manufacturing site in Cherbourg, France.
So far, 60 of the 200 employees have been recruited. They have now begun training at the factory’s center of excellence.
Opened in April 2018, the Cherbourg facility became the first wind turbine blade manufacturing site in France, according to GE. A year later, the site counted 120 employees, 34% of whom are women.
A prototyping phase began in January 2019, when the teams started the production of five 107-meter blades, which will be installed on GE’s Haliade-X 12 MW offshore wind turbine. Meanwhile, in Saint-Nazaire, France, GE is producing the Haliade-X’s nacelles.
Two blades will be shipped to testing facilities, and three will be assembled on the Haliade-X prototype site in Rotterdam. The expanded production workforce will allow LM Wind Power to prepare for the blades’ commercial production phase.
“A significant part of the employees at our site today are from the region of Normandy,” notes Erwan Le Floch, the site’s director. “We are proud to take part in the region’s social and economic development, and we are happy to create more jobs in the surrounding community this year.”
“This project creates enthusiasm as the factory is ramping up, and we have witnessed a significant combination of efforts as we use the expertise from our facilities worldwide to train the people in Cherbourg,” adds Lukasz Cejrowski, project manager. “The teams are excited to have produced the first blade in the world longer than 100 meters. We are welcoming new people with diverse backgrounds, and at the same time, we are building a new blade of a size we have never achieved before.”
