Empower Global Expansion of Wind Power Industry:
YQN's 'Three Guarantees' in Transporting Large Wind Power Equipment Overseas
As the demand for green energy rises worldwide, more Chinese wind turbines are rotating around the globe. According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance data, over half of the world's top ten wind turbine manufacturers are from China, with their exports reaching 42 countries globally by the end of 2021.
However, taking the wind power industry overseas is no easy task. From the tower, blades, to the mainframe, each component is oversized, with the nacelle alone weighing 120 tons and the tower not less than 90 tons. Irregular shapes and varying transport requirements add to the complexity. Therefore, the wind power industry sets high industry standards for vessel scheduling, cargo consolidation, lifting operations, on-board packaging, and reinforcement.
YQN, as a one-stop international logistics digital service platform, has managed multiple wind power industry logistics projects, offering mature solutions for the entire industrial chain.
In 2021, we successfully transported 16 sets of wind power equipment to Southeast Asia. And in the first half of 2022, amid pandemic restrictions in Shanghai, YQN successfully transported multiple sets of wind power equipment to Europe through customized solutions, including altering land transport to waterway transport and multi-location shipments for overseas delivery.
Emergency Overseas Shipping During the Pandemic
In 2022, one of YQN's long-term domestic wind power enterprise partners planned to build a large wind power station in Europe. With construction deadlines in mind, they required all shipping vessels to depart from China before the end of March.
During the pandemic, this demand isn’t easy and posed two major challenges:
1. The customer's factories are located in various places across China, which needs multiple pickups from different locations to match diverse vessel schedules to ship overseas.
2. With strict Covid-19 containment measures in China, conventional solutions faced challenges, requiring the flexibility to adjust logistics plans promptly.
Adjust to Ensuring On-time Delivery
To ensure timely delivery, YQN carefully selected shipping companies that met the requirements for wind turbine blades and tower length, weight, and departure time. The wind power equipment for this transportation is of large and medium size, with each wind turbine blade nearly 70 meters in length and over 30 blades in total. And there are also mainframes and towers. After several rounds of screening, there were limited transport capacities that met the requirements.
Considering transportation efficiency and cost, YQN finally planned a two-step solution to ensure on-time delivery. We rented two heavy-lift vessels, with the first one transporting the main components of the wind power equipment and the second one carrying the tower sections. Despite the separate transportation, the entire set of wind power equipment's departure time did not exceed two weeks, and the arrival time at the destination differed by only one week, ensuring the smooth progress of the customer's shipping plan.
YQN Logistics Advantages:
Transporting wind power equipment overseas often requires meticulous preparations. However, this particular project was time-sensitive and demanding, which tested YQN's ability to manage and coordinate resources with ship owners, ports, fleets, and various suppliers. The team managed to implement the plan flawlessly within less than a month, strictly controlling every detail to ensure the project proceeded as scheduled.
Photo taken on-site of YQN team
Urgently Alter from Land Transport to Waterway Transport
Transporting wind power equipment demands a high level of logistics expertise. Steering a wind power project requires swift responses and solutions to unexpected situations, and both are essential parts of a comprehensive solution.
When the customer's goods were shipped from the factory in Jiangyin City, the transport vehicles come to a halt due to pandemic-related road closures. With the departure deadline looming, YQN swiftly activated an alternative plan: communicate with the port and switch to waterway transportation. We used inland deck barges to navigate the internal waterways instead of land routes to transport wind turbine towers to Taicang Port, and successfully delivered the wind power equipment to the delivery terminal as scheduled.
YQN Logistics Advantages:
How to quickly switch from land to water transportation? How to swiftly secure compliant-sized deck barges? All of these depend on YQN's profound industry resources and specialized knowledge of the wind power sector, significantly reducing trial-and-error costs.
Photo taken on-site of YQN team
Detail-oriented Control to Ensure Safe Delivery
Transporting wind power equipment demands meticulous attention to detail, from protection and loading to transportation safety, all aspects require careful management to avoid potential risks.
Upon arrival at the port, professional cranes were required for loading the wind power equipment onto the vessels. YQN's team pre-booked suitable cranes based on the equipment's dimensions and weight. Moreover, considering the high-value and bare-stacked nature of the wind power equipment, the team designed secure binding and lifting plans, effectively enhancing the goods' resistance to wind risks during transit and ensuring safety during the voyage.
During transportation, the main equipment needed to remain powered. YQN's team engaged in extensive communication with the shipping company beforehand and meticulously coordinated with the crew during the equipment loading process to ensure continuous power supply and prevent any power-related malfunctions.
YQN Logistics Advantages:
Transporting wind power equipment is a highly challenging and comprehensive international logistics project, demanding high logistics resources and specialized service capabilities from logistics service providers.
YQN is committed to continuously improving logistics solutions for the wind power industry's overseas transportation, providing stable and reliable support for more wind power equipment industry partners with overseas demands.
Photo taken on-site of YQN team
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YQN Operation Team
info@yqnlink.com
