Windy city: how wind turbine blade manufacturing is boosting Hull's economy

More than 500 huge wind-turbine blades lined the banks of the river Humber in February.

Each one was 75m long – equivalent to the wingspan of an A380 – and weighed 28 tonnes. They were waiting to be shipped out to Hornsea One, the world’s biggest offshore windfarm, which is being installed 75km off the Yorkshire coast, will power a million homes. 

Since opening in December 2016, the Siemens Gamesa factory that makes these blades has created more than 1,000 jobs in Hull. The factory has a capacity of 450 blades a year, and is also creating wind turbines for the East Anglia ONE windfarm. Those blades will be shipped down the coast to Great Yarmouth, where they will be assembled into 102 7MW wind turbines, and sited 43km off the Suffolk coast, to provide enough energy for more than 630,000 homes.

“It’s great to witness the success of the Siemens Gamesa and Associated British Ports investment into the city of Hull,” said Alan Brattan, chair of the IMechE Yorkshire regional committee. “The project has been transformational in that it has brought a new but vital industry into the Humber region and numerous skilled jobs.”

Built in one piece

An 850-strong team works on the blades, which are made of balsa wood and resin-impregnated glass fibre. Because of their size, construction of each B75 blade represents a huge feat of engineering.

Rather than using the clamshell designs favoured by other manufacturers, Siemens Gamesa makes its blades in one piece. They are precisely formed using vacuum moulds, finely finished and then painted. Siemens has a unique patented process that allows it to mould the blade as one hollow component with no seams or joints. 

Ray Thompson, head of business development at Siemens Gamesa, said: “Because the lay-up is a manual process and not too complex, we didn’t need a big workforce with existing skills, so we could recruit on attitude and ability.” 

He added: “Because we only make one product there, that’s really helped us with efficiency. We’ve been able to get up to speed very quickly.”

The factory has drawn an array of illustrious visitors, including the Queen and IMechE president Tony Roche. The elegant blade structures have also captured the public imagination. In 2017, artist Nayan Kulkarni installed one of the blades in the centre of Hull, in a temporary exhibition that was seen by more than a million people.