The South Korean AMSC division, headquartered in Busan and the Indian AMSC division, with headquarters in Delhi, will provide local applications engineering, sales, business development and field service support for AMSC customers.
Korean customers include LS Cable, KEPCO, KEPRI, KERI, Doosan Heavy Industries and Hyundai Heavy Industries while AMSC’s first customers in India are Ghodawat Energy Limited and Inox Wind Limited.
The current power situation in India and South Korea is almost parallel. Over the past decade, South Korea’s peak power demand has increased approximately 68%, placing significant strains on the country’s power grid. The country is investing aggressively in grid technologies to support Korea’s economic growth and its increasing supply of renewable energy.
Meanwhile, according to the World Bank, roughly 40% of residences in India are without electricity, and blackouts are common throughout the country’s main cities. To address this problem, the Indian government has established an ambitious Power for All by 2012 plan that will require the country’s installed generation capacity to grow from 140 GW to nearly 225 GW by 2012. It also will require billions of dollars of investment in India’s transmission and distribution infrastructure.
Commenting on India as a market opportunity, Greg Yurek, Founder and CEOof AMSC says: “India is beginning to tap into its renewable energy resources and is making significant investments to vastly improve the throughput and reliability of its power grid.”
According to the Global Wind Energy Council’s Global Wind 2008 Report, India now ranks fifth in the world in terms of total installed wind power capacity. Capacity in the country grew by 22% in 2008 to 9.6 GW. The Indian Wind Energy Association estimates that the country has 65 GW of wind power potential.
Similarly, regarding Korea, Dan McGahn, Senior Vice President and General Manager of AMSC Superconductors says: “Korea has long been a key area for AMSC given its focus on energy technology innovation and manufacturing excellence. With the formation of AMSC Korea, we can accelerate the adoption of our power electronics and superconductor solutions in the region.”
AMSC has close relationships with several South Korea-based enterprises engaged in the development of superconductor technologies and wind energy systems. Among them is the Korea Electric Power Research Institute (KEPRI) and LS Cable , Korea’s largest power cable manufacturer. AMSC has been contracted by KEPRI to perform transmission planning studies to optimise 22.9 kV superconductor solutions for the Korea Electric Power Company’s (KEPCO) Icheon substation.
AMSC has also formed a strategic alliance with LS Cable to advance commercial sales of superconductor cables.
The two wind turbine manufacturing customers in India, Ghodawat Industries and Inox Wind, licensed AMSC Windtec™ turbine designs within the past 18 months. AMSC, which is the exclusive power electronic system supplier for all Ghodawat and Inox wind turbines has received initial orders for five wind turbine electrical systems from Ghodawat and three wind turbine electrical systems from Inox.