Segment
Wind power: nacelles, blades, towers and foundations
A wind turbine is a small number of very large components, and the industry's economics have been driven by making them larger. This segment covers the drivetrain, the blades and — for offshore projects — the foundations and vessels that dominate the cost.
In one sentence
Wind power converts the kinetic energy of moving air into electricity using turbines whose blades drive a generator housed in a nacelle at the top of a tower.
Energy capture rises with the square of rotor diameter and with the cube of wind speed, which is why turbines have grown relentlessly and why height matters — wind is faster and steadier further from the ground. The result is machines with rotors well over two hundred metres in diameter offshore, and a logistics problem to match.
Onshore and offshore are different businesses. Onshore turbines are constrained by transport: a blade has to travel by road. Offshore turbines can be far larger because they arrive by sea, but the foundations, the installation vessels and the subsea cables dominate project cost in a way they never do on land.
How this breaks down
Split by the major components, and by what changes when the turbine is at sea.
- Nacelles and drivetrainsThe machine at the top of the tower, and the choice that decides its weight and its magnet content.Breaks down into: Gearboxes · Generators · Power converters · Bearings and castings4 pages belowChokepoint
- Blades and compositesGlass and carbon fibre, structural adhesive, and a transport problem that shapes the whole industry.Definition pageChokepoint
- Offshore foundationsMonopiles, jackets, floating platforms and the specialised vessels that install them.Breaks down into: Foundation fabrication · Floating platforms · Installation vessels3 pages belowChokepoint
- TowersThe largest single piece of steel in a turbine, made near the market because it cannot be shipped economically.Definition pageChokepoint
What this depends on
2 of these are marked as a chokepoint: a handful of qualified suppliers, a multi-year lead time, or a single geography.
- Supply chainChokepoint
Rare-earth magnets
Direct-drive generators use large permanent magnets, drawing on the same constrained supply as vehicle motors.
Rare-earth magnets - Supply chainChokepoint
Grid connection and transmission
Wind resources are often far from demand, so projects depend on transmission that frequently does not yet exist.
Transmission and HVDC - Resource
Sites and consent
Onshore build rate is limited by where turbines are allowed and how long approval takes, not by how many machines can be manufactured.
Companies across Wind
Every company named on a step below this page, ordered by how many of those steps it appears at. Compiled from the pages themselves rather than written separately, so the two cannot disagree. Not a ranking and not a recommendation.
- Siemens EnergyGermany3 steps
Nacelles and drivetrains · Generators · Blades and composites
- Vestas Wind SystemsDenmark3 steps
Nacelles and drivetrains · Power converters · Blades and composites
- ABBSwitzerland2 steps
- Aker SolutionsOslo1 step
49 more companies appear at a single step each; they are named on the pages for those steps.
How these pages are written
Each page explains one technology in plain language, states what it depends on, and names companies by what they supply at that step. Company roles are described qualitatively and deliberately carry no market shares, revenue figures or rankings — those change faster than an explainer can, and a stale number is worse than none. Ticker links point at company pages on this site and are provided for reference only.
Nothing here is investment advice, a recommendation, or a forecast. A company named on a page about a technology is not thereby a good investment, and the chokepoints described are structural facts about supply chains rather than predictions about prices. Technology moves; where a page describes something as unresolved or in development, that was true when it was written.