TURKS BUILDING WIND

Turkish Wind Energy Growing Fast with Feed-In-Tariff in the Pipeline
Levent Bas, July 30, 2009 (Matter Network)
and
Farmers turn fields into cash
Aram Ekin Duran, July 7, 2009 (Turkish Daily News)

SUMMARY
Turkey’s present installed wind power capacity in 490 megawatts. Not impressive compared to the Texas 8,000 megawatts, Iowa’s 3,000 megawatts or China’s 12,000 megawatts, right? But consider the context.

Turkey built its first 0.5 megawatt turbine in 1998. It had 34 turbines generating 20.1 megawatts in 2005 when the the Turkish Parliament passed a Renewable Energy Resources law. Capacity doubled in 2006 (to 50 megawatts) and tripled in 2007 (to 147 megawatts).

In 2008-09, while its economy shrank 13.8% and unemployment went to 14.9%, Turkey's wind power capacity MORE THAN TRIPLED to ~490 megawatts!

Driven by its commitment to the Kyoto accords to which it recently signed on, Turkey plans to have 1,500 megawatts of installed wind power capacity by 2010.

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Knowledge is more than power, it’s a money magnate. The Turkish Electricity Survey and Development Administration (EIE) in 2007 developed the Turkish Wind Atlas. When developers saw what it promised, they brought money to Turkey by the trainload. The Market Authority EMRA has licensed 2,900 megawatts of new capacity (78 projects) and has 78,000 megawatts of license applications on its waiting list.

In the wind-rich northwestern Turkish province of Balıkesir, 500 Bandırma villagers – once little more than subsistence farmers – are living in luxurious villas, driving classy cars, speculating in real estate and monitoring government-subsidized power prices.

In the 250-house village of Buğdaylı, 100+ people have sold 3,800 dunams of land to Çolakoğlu Metalurji, Turkey’s second largest iron and steel company, at amounts 5 or 6 times what the land was previously worth. Villagers in Bezirci, 7 kilometers away, are watching closely.

Turkey has legendary sun as well as powerful winds but to fully develop its immense capacities, New Energy advocates contend the nation needs modern transmission and new incentive policies. The most important policy for which they are pushing is a European-quality Feed-in Tariff (FiT) with a rate increase from the present 55 euros per megawatt-hour to 80 euros per megawatt-hour for wind. The Turkish Parliament is hesitant but will reach a decision in the Fall.

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Meanwhile, the power price keeps rising. It is reportedly up 31% since last year. The next years are going to be exciting and full of opportunities for domestic and foreign investors. The Investment Support and Promotion Agency of Turkey (ISPAT) has identified renewable energy as an attractive area for foreign investment and is said to be a good point of contact for any foreign investor that wants to learn more about investment opportunities in the country

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COMMENTARY
The use of wind power in Turkey is contemporaneous with its development in Europe and goes back at least 800-to-1,000 years. Modern Turkey, though, fell behind, installing its first 0.5 megawatt turbine after Germany had built ~3,000 megawatts of capacity.

Like almost every other nation in the world, Turkey discovered something very important when it started building New Energy: It’s hard to do with an old transmission grid. In the absence of wires and switching capacity cable of bringing wind-generated electricity onto the wires, wind power can actually create problems. The good news: Fixing the transmission system is necessary anyway. Electrical transmission is a key component of the information superhighway, information is the basis of knowledge and knowledge means power and money, not to mention New Energy.

With a new, higher FiT in the offing and new transmission under discussion, wind manufacturers are building hard in Turkey. Enercon has a production facility in Izmir where it has been making 0.8 megawatt turbines since 2005. It and Vestas have 60% of the Turkish market, but new players are coming on. Soyut Enerji builds small wind turbines in Turkey and Model Enerji is about to be the first domestic megawatt-sized turbine builder.

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Development companies like EnerjiSA, Çolakoğlu and Borusan are invading villages on the Bandırma-Çanakkale Highway like Buğdaylı, Edincik, Bezirci, Paşaçiftlik, Hıdırköy and Şirinçavuş, offering 10-to-15 times value for the arid agricultural lands around them. Taş Yapı, Ağaoğlu and an unnamed Italian company are expected to arrive any day to join the bidding.

Life for the newly enriched villagers has changed dramatically. First, they renovated, rebuilt and repaired their clinics and mosques. Then they started thinking about themselves. Farm animals are getting fat while villas are being built and the rural 2-lane roads are getting clogged with luxury cars and heavy-duty tractors.

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Developers are paying extravangant prices in rational and irrational spasms of buying, in anticipation of ever-growing value. Farm fields have sold for 11,000 liras, olive groves for 25,000 liras and coastal lands for 30-to-35,000 liras. The Buğdaylı headman’s office, which processes titles, puts the total land sales at ~900,000 liras.

Some locals grumble. They see life transforming before their eyes and wonder what people who know little other than the soil will do if or when the money stops coming. The villages around the ones that have struck it rich are watching and waiting. Some see miraculous wealth coming at them and some see terrifying change coming at them.

Some, perhaps a little more grounded, simply see an opportunity to harvest bigger, better money from lands where their families have earned a sweat-soaked, muscle-sore, hard-scrabble living for centuries. They also see an opportunity to learn new work for a new era in New Energy. EnerjiSA, a subsidiary of Sabancı Holding, is developing in the area and has put some 300-to-400 people to work. Nearby villagers are excitedly talking about reports EnerjiSA will hire 600 more people in 2010.

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QUOTES
- Hüseyin Meşeli, 78, lifelong resident of Buğdaylı, a village near wind-rich Bandırma: “Our family moved to Bandırma 130 years ago from Bulgaria. We have always dealt with farming, and picked up a scanty livelihood. I would not believe if someone told me that these lands would be as valuable as gold. But one day, some people came and paid a high amount of money for our lands and made us rich..."
- Süleyman Yazıc, village clerk, wind-rich Buğdaylı: "The lands, to which nobody paid even 5,000 liras until a while ago, have been sold for 25 to 30,000 liras. The fields where animals were pastured have made villagers rich...Some villagers have reaped 700 to 800,000 liras from the sale of land. Villagers quickly changed their cars and then renewed their houses. Some 60 new cars and 15 ‘çift çekerli’ tractors, and around 10 secondhand cars have entered the village. Some people have established businesses for their children in Bandırma while others have purchased lands in touristic regions.”
- Hüseyin Menşeli, Bandrma resident, who bought his son a new home in another village with wind proceeds: “When spreading the money to my two children and grandchildren, what was left for me was 160,000 liras…”

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- Ahmet Çetin, Bandrma resident, unhappy with the sale price of the land and the changes brought by wind: “We are farmers. We have earned well amid the crisis climate but we cannot succeed in any other profession. We have bought houses, cars ... but what is next? What will we do when the money is gone?”
- Ömer Alkın, 59, resident of Bezirci, a village near wind-rich Buğdaylı: “[Wind developer Sabancı Holding] came and paid 10 liras for land worth 2 liras. Then the others pushed the boat out..."
- Basri Eken, 35, resident of Bezirci: “At present, 300 to 400 people are working at Sabancı. They will reportedly hire 600 more people next year. But there are only five people from our village. I hope they will employ more people from our region.”