Finland is a young wind power nation, and commercial wind power gained its foothold in the country as late as in the 2010s. Subsequently, expansion has been rapid, and Finland has become a forerunner in building high wind turbines with large rotors.
The Finnish landscape with its many forests and lakes make the local wind conditions special. Rendering the market even more special is the great number of small forest owners. A middle-sized wind farm can be located on a piece of land owned by as many as 200-300 people.
This fact poses high demands on the wind farm developer’s people skills, especially in the project’s initial stages.
Landowners are the key stakeholders
The possibility for landowners to benefit from wind farming in addition to forestry is widely understood. Several of the projects we supply services to are initiated by local landowners.
Thanks to close landowner collaboration, our projects are firmly anchored locally. This reduces the risk of resistance, while at the same time lowering the risk of lengthy appeal processes.
Consultants out in the field
Due to geographic reasons, Finnish wind power is concentrated on the west coast, where the wind conditions are the best. On the west coast lives also most of the Swedish-speaking population in Finland, which means that anyone wanting to build a wind farm in the region must be able to communicate both in Swedish and in Finnish. Etha Wind’s personnel communicates fluently in both languages.
Over the years, Etha Wind has become an expert in running successful wind farm projects. Our work methods rely on taking all stakeholders into consideration and making sure the projects are locally anchored.
We also make sure that our consultants do not work at their desks exclusively. When they are out in the field, speaking with locals, explaining how the wind farm favours both them and the environment, projects have better chances of succeeding. Moreover, the consulting reports are of higher quality when done by people with hands-on experience.