European turbine makers continue to face headwinds

The outlook for renewable energy has never been brighter. So why are so few manufacturers profiting from booming demand for wind turbines?

As governments commit to net-zero strategies, many have laid out plans for accelerating the rollout of renewables to decarbonise their national power supplies. However, despite the growing demand for wind turbines, manufacturers have continued to see profits fall as commodity prices and logistics costs rise. Danish wind turbine manufacturer Vestas generated more than €5.5bn ($6.3bn) in revenue for Q3 2021 and built its backlog of orders to 24GW of capacity, valued at €19.3bn. However, its Ebit before special items fell to €325mn from €412mn in Q3 2020, while overall profit halved from €290mn to €123mn. “The quarter was… characterised by supply chain instability and rising energy prices as we