Washington’s Vancouver port prepares for large wind turbine project

Washington’s Vancouver port prepares for large wind turbine project    Washington state’s Port of Vancouver plans to handle more than 1,000 sections of wind turbine components over the next six months for the development of a large wind farm in nearby Ellensburg, Wash.
   This is the fourth wind energy project the port has partnered with Vestas American Wind Technology, based in Portland, Ore. The 127-unit Wild Horse Wind Farm is Puget Sound Energy’s second wind-power electric generation facility in Washington state.
   Last year, the Vancouver port handled components for 83 wind turbines destined to Hopkins Ridge wind farm. For this project, the port recorded more than 13,000 labor hours dockside and “substantial business” for trucking companies “in the form of 650 trips to the wind farm site 282 miles away in Dayton, Wash.”
   To accommodate the increased traffic of wind turbine components, Vancouver recently bought a 140-metric-ton heavy lift crane. “This crane brings a whole new dimension for cargo handling in the Columbia River, positioning Vancouver as a premier project cargo port,” said Alastair Smith, the port’s senior director of marketing and operations, in a statement.