windadmin posted on April 29, 2010 13:23
Astraeus Wind plans to establish new blade facility
Melissa Domsic
Lansing State Journal
EATON RAPIDS - A local wind energy manufacturer and its partners have received a $6 million state grant to develop advanced wind turbine blade components.
Astraeus Wind Energy Inc. was awarded the grant Wednesday through the Michigan Economic Development Corp.'s Centers of Energy Excellence program. Astraeus formed last summer as an affiliate of Eaton Rapids-based Dowding Machining LLC.
Several partnerships
Dowding is contracting with Sterling Heights-based MAG Industrial Automation Systems LLC to build machines for the wind turbine component production. It's also working with Midland-based Dow Chemical Co. and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory based in Tennessee on materials and technical expertise.
The $6 million grant will help Astraeus establish a manufacturing center that will produce components for carbon-fiber turbine blades.
Earlier stimulus grant
The company in December snagged $7 million in federal stimulus funding to build a machine that produces wind turbine hubs.
"We will have a facility in the next year to put that machine in," said Jeff Metts, president of Astraeus and Dowding Industries. "As it moves forward, it will have to go to much larger processes after that."
Manufacturing will begin at MAG's facility in Port Huron, but Astraeus hopes to build four blade factories throughout the state that would each employ 350 to 500 people, Metts said.