Winds of change – Danish firm helps Yokohama go green

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“Sugoi!” shout members of Yokohama City’s Environmental Planning Bureau below the giant tower of the city’s prized wind turbine. Its wings have started to move, and even on a rather stagnant winter day, the turbine is producing clean energy for Japan’s second-largest city.

The idea of constructing the “Hama Wing”, as it is affectionately known, originally came from a staff suggestion at the bureau, says Go Kimura, assistant manager of the Environmental Energy Division. “We believe that the shape symbolises the ‘environmental action city, Yokohama’,” he says. “It becomes a part of environmental education and public awareness.”

Although the Hama Wing is meant to serve more as an environmental ideal for the city, rather than a vital part of its electricity grid, related energy statistics speak to its success. With adjustable wings that position automatically based on wind direction, the wind turbine produces enough electricity to power about 500 houses a year, and its clean energy represents a saving of 560 kilolitres of oil annually. That’s equal to approximately 830 tonnes of CO2.

These impressive numbers come from decades of trial and error in Denmark where Vestas, supplier of the Hama Wing, is based. “Economy, performance, reliability, system guarantee … these are the reasons we chose [Vestas],” says Kimura.

A global firm dedicated exclusively to wind energy, Vestas has taken over a century to become the world’s leading wind turbine manufacturer. It all began in 1898, when 22-year-old Hand Smith Hansen purchased a small-town blacksmith shop. An inherently astute businessman, Hansen and his son Peder — who officially founded Vestas in 1945 — produced an array of goods, from steel window frames to domestic appliances and agricultural vehicles.

But it wasn’t until the 1970s, after the global oil crisis, that Vestas got serious about the promising technology of wind turbines. Birger T Madsen, Vestas’ first engineer, recalls that the ’70s was a time when “if you were out and about and started talking about wind turbines, people thought you were a tree hugger. It wasn’t something for a well established machine manufacturer.”

So Peder Hansen and his son Finn did what they thought best. “We didn’t want our suppliers to laugh at us, [or] our customers … so we pulled a curtain and built them [turbines] behind it,” says Finn.

And that was a good thing. Early trials did not go well for the company; some prototypes went spinning out of control in poor weather. The saving grace was found in Henrik Stiesdal, a young student who was successfully building wind turbines nearby. Vestas hired the young man who would become the chief engineer behind the wind turbines that can be found all over the world today.

In Yokohama, positioned strategically across from the swanky Minato Mirai 21 waterfront district, the turbine is more than an environmental statement. To pay for construction, the Environmental Planning Bureau issued “Hama Windmill Bonds” to those who invested over ¥500,000 in construction. In return, their names can be seen on the electricity display below the turbine. For the cost of maintenance and support for a 10-year period, the bureau also enticed 45 corporate donors with the ceremonial “Green Power Certificate”. This can be used as a green symbol in company profiles as did Kirin and Nissan, who also then report to the Japanese government about their investment in clean technology.

Though Kimura says that staff entrepreneurship in the bureau is no longer encouraged due to a change in city government, Yokohama is still dedicated to becoming greener.

“The city of Yokohama aggressively takes renewable energy technologies into public facilities like schools and in the subway,” he says. “We have some power-generation systems such as solar, wind, water and biomass as well.”

And it’s with the cooperation of international companies like Vestas that this has become a reality.