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Construction

Our best in class products for wind energy are:

Foundations and flanges:

  • Profiles in special bar quality steels for foundations and flanges (profiles up to 250kg/m)

Towers:

  • Heavy plates in S235, S275, S355, and S420 to S460 - including J, J2, JR, M, ML, N, and NL specifications with thicknesses up to 120mm, widths up to 3300mm, lengths up to 21 000mm and in unit weights of up to 18 tonnes.
  • Amstrong® hot rolled coils from S460MC to S500MC and thicknesses up to 20mm
  • Rolled sections in steel grades from S235 to S500 and CVN to -50°C. Also in offshore qualities according to EN 10225 and ASTM, HISTAR®, Z and W grades, Arcorox®, 16Mo3, etc. The offer includes standard and special rolled sections, channels, ASTM A6 shapes, standard merchant bars, and heavy angles up to 300mm with 35mm thickness.
  • Our full product range of plates, coils, and sections is available in XCarb® recycled and renewably produced steel, made from over 75% scrap and 100% renewable electricity.

Nacelles:

  • Specific beams
  • Heavy plates

Generators:

  • Wide range of electrical steels, non-grain oriented (ONG) including M400-50A
  • Electrical steels with high permeability (M400XP50A & M470P65A)
  • Electrical steels with low losses (M250-50A in thicknesses from 0.35 to 1mm)

Gearboxes, yaws, and pitches:

  • Seamless rolled ring steels for ring gears (34CrNiMo6, 18CrNiMo7-6, 14CrMoV6-9, 31CrMoV9), orientation systems, and coupling systems (42CrMo4)

Mooring ropes for floating wind turbines:

  • Sheathed spiral strand wire: ArcelorMittal provides a complete mooring turn-key package with mooring wire, sockets, and offshore transportation reels

Related news and technical articles

Wind towers

The use of fossil fuels and the conventional methods of producing electricity are going to diminish drastically over the next 30 years. They are being replaced by renewable energy sources with a much smaller environmental impact, such as wind power. Many countries are investing in wind as key part of their renewable energy mix as it is local, competitive, and sustainable. Currently, wind power accounts for about 17% of Europe’s electricity demand, while its worldwide share is around 7%.

Land-based and offshore wind towers

While most of the wind power installed is land-based, offshore wind farms are gaining momentum. Stronger and more constant winds in the open sea enable offshore wind farms to generate much more electricity per installed capacity compared to wind farms on land.

Whereas their design and installation are complex tasks, offshore wind turbines have less of a visual impact on landscape and people. Therefore, structures can be taller, making them more efficient. Depending on water depths, offshore wind towers can have fixed or floating foundations.

ArcelorMittal is committed to offering steel products and steel solutions to support wind tower manufacturers. Thanks to our worldwide industrial footprint coupled with customised services, we are able to provide the largest range of steel solutions for each part of the wind tower.

Every day, the onshore and offshore windmill sector brings new technical challenges to the wind tower market. Our R&D centres contribute to many projects identifying the future vision for the wind energy sector and wind turbine technology with new, lighter materials meant to limit welding seams involved in turbine construction.

Our heavy plates range is used to manufacture both the tower and, in offshore installations, the jackets that keep the turbine stable on the sea floor. We also supply non-oriented, fully processed electrical steels for the medium and high-power generators sitting at the top of the wind tower. These steels possess all of the required magnetic properties to maximise the amount of energy each turbine can produce.

Our steels for offshore structures offer improved workability and weldability and can be supplied thermomechanically rolled or normalised. They can be utilised in applications such as platforms and equipment for new fixed and floating wind towers.

ArcelorMittal can conduct the following tests if required:

  • ultrasonic testing
  • reduced carbon equivalent (CEV) or parameter crack measurement (PCM) values
  • transversal impact tests
  • resistance to lamellar tearing, perpendicular to the surface of the product as per EN 10164 (Z test)
  • post-weld heat treatment test (PWHT)