Catching Wind

It takes your breath away when you see how big these blades are! Gamesa, with headquarters in Spain and one of the world's biggest wind turbine makers and developers, opened up this plant in Ebensburg, Pa. six years ago. The plant is nestled in Western, Pa among several steel and manufacturing businesses that have been forced to close in a down economy.
Ever since opening, the Gamesa plant has been operating at full capacity, except for a brief time when the plant had to re-tool for a redesigned blade.

More than 300 workers are busy here turning out two blades a day- It is a continuous 24-hour operation Monday through Friday and sometimes on Saturday. The blades start out as carbon fiber and fiberglass composite fabric that is rolled onto big metal forms to begin the process of shaping a giant blade. That rough form is then cured, dried, sanded, coated with more layers and then inspected inch-by-inch by hand. After several steps within a 24-hour day, the blade is then loaded onto a truck for delivery. It is a very precise work to turn out one of these massive blades. Workers inspect every aspect of the blade by hand and with cameras and ultrasound. I've not gone through all the steps but I will tell you we were taken by how busy and productive the plant was.

Nearly every bit of material is re-used. The dust on the floor is sold to a company that uses it to make props and forms- like dinasaur bones etc.(they were very proud to see one of these forms shown on a CSI episode) Yes, the dust on the floor! Nothing goes to waste. Big racks of plastic wrapping from the material packaging were headed off to another plant for re-use. It is a precise line of work- imagine these huge blades, as big as a house. It takes skilled designers, developers and machinists to make these blades. Throughout every step- workers in the plant by hand inspect every inch of the blades using handheld cameras, ultrasound and their hands. Then they hand sand and smooth the blades-- this all happens in 24 hours. (not just the finishing and perfecting, but the ENTIRE process) The blades made at the Gamesa plant have been used at nearby windfarms, as well as around the country and the world. We spent a lot of time filming workers loading the blade on a special truck bed that looked more than twice the length of a regular truck. At the finishing station, we watched as dozens of employees inspected every inch of the final product.

Many of the employees here were previously displaced workers in the steel and other industries. Now, as members of the United SteelWorkers Union, they enjoy great benefits and, at times, overtime pay. Ron Sanders, the plant manager explained on camera that he came from the auto sector- and much of his focus there was on downsizing. Working at this Gamesa plant is a different story altogether. The plant is at capacity and it has made a huge positive impact on the community. This work here keeps trucking companies busy, local business buzzing and families thriving. We talked to a worker who lost his previous job at a ball bearing plant that shut down.

At any rate, we woke up the day of the shoot to hear depressing news on the television about the stock markets falling, the global debt crisis and about a U.S. economy that is seriously struggling. And then we visited Gamesa and interviewed a number of great people talking about their work at the busy wind turbine blade plant. When you pull up to the plant, there are hundreds of these giant blades waiting to be shipped. The inventory right now is lean because there are so many wind farms being developed here in the U.S. and also around the globe that as soon as the blades are finished they are pretty much loaded onto to trucks and shipped out. Gamesa hasn't stopped making a U.S. footprint here at Ebensburg. The company has operations outside of Philadelphia for building nacelles (the brains of a wind turbine that is about the size of a bus) and they are working to expand into offshore wind manufacturing and windfarm development. To be honest, I haven't even begun to explain all the windfarms Gamesa has a hand in here in the U.S. This kind of stuff doesn't happen without creating jobs!