U.S. loan helps export wind turbines to Honduras

   A U.S. Export-Import Bank direct loan in the amount of $28.6 million will allow Gamesa Wind US, based in Trevose, Pa., to assemble 12 wind turbines for export to a Honduran power company.
   The transaction helps to expand a project first supported by the bank in 2010, when its long-term financing of 51 U.S.-built turbine generators established the Cerro de Hula Wind Farm in Santa Ana municipality, 22 kilometers south of Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. The project developer and borrower, Energía Eólica de Honduras S.A., will sell the electricity to the Central American nation’s utility, Empresa Nacional de Energía Eléctrica.
   The Cerro de Hula Wind Farm now produces about 6 percent of the electrical power in Honduras. With the additions from this transaction, the wind farm will have 63 wind turbines and a total installed capacity of 126 megawatts providing power to the country’s grid.
   “While the U.S. wind industry slowly is recovering after late renewal of the U.S. Production Tax Credit in January, thanks to Ex-Im Bank these export projects are creating new business opportunities in emerging markets, and are supporting good-paying jobs throughout the entire supply chain,” said Gamesa North American chairman David Flitterman, in a statement.