|
Updated: 7:45 PM Aug 26, 2009
Wind Turbine Roadblocks in Recession
An Eaton Rapids company that invested millions in green technology isn't seeing the demand it had hoped for. An Eaton Rapids company that invested millions in green technology isn't seeing the demand it had hoped for.
Posted: 6:29 PM Aug 26, 2009Reporter: Tiffany Teasley Email Address: Tiffany.Teasley@wilx.com |
|
It's a 35,000 square foot $12 million investment in green technology.
"This facility has been open for almost a year and it was built to do green components," said Jeff Metts, President of Dowding Machining.
They're building components like wind turbine parts and platforms, that Gov. Granholm continues to tout, she toured Dowding Industries back in 2007, after it was awarded a state grant to build a new facility.
"It is a very difficult market right now," Metts said.
And that's why the Eaton Rapids manufacturing facility isn't producing the green components they had hoped to.
"There's just no money out there, there's no money to get, you're in a survival mode of your core business being off, so it's a very difficult time from that standpoint," Metts said.
That's because Metts says the demand for green products just isn't a reality in a recession.
"It was very difficult when you know the direction that you're going and all of sudden that direction gets put on hold and you were already into it," Metts said.
So in the meantime they've gone back to what they know, building machinery for construction and agriculture until the market turns around.
"All these machines have work on them and that is what we're trying to do to fill the process until we can move into the wind," Metts said.
While the market for parts like wind turbine components may be slow going now, the company is expecting a resurgence in the green movement in the second half of 2010.
"I think third and fourth quarter of next year, you're going to see wind really start to pick up and I think 2011 it will be back beyond where it was before," Metts said.
And Metts says when the market if back in the black the sky is the limit for going green.
"So that it becomes a competitive market and it withstands the market place," Metts said.
|
Popular Searches Powered by Local.com |
- Wear Red Today For Women's Heart Health
- Birth Control Recall: Legal Options?
- Woman Charged with Torturing Step-Grandchild
- Michigan Included in Egg Recall
- Extended Unemployment Benefits Cut Off
- Teacher Defends Students in Waverly High School Fight
- Fire Damages Holt Duplex
- Man Injured Trying to Save Burning House
- Potential Changes To Kindergarten Enrollment Age
- Portion of Lansing River Trail Closed
- Potential Changes To Kindergarten Enrollment Age
9 Comments - Teacher Defends Students in Waverly High School Fight
8 Comments - Truck Driver to be Cited in Train Derailment
7 Comments - Critics: Lansing Needs to Make a Decision Now on High School Closure
4 Comments - Cancer Survivor Suspended for Hair Switches School
4 Comments - Kwaske To Stand Trial In Gruesome Murder
4 Comments
| WILX Poll |


