Wind tower suppliers see US onshore market poised to 'accelerate meaningfully' in 2025-26

Two leading wind tower manufacturers see the present soft US onshore market firming next year and even more so in 2026 as declining steel prices and lucrative federal tax credits improve the economics of projects in development, allowing them to get built.

“We believe domestic onshore wind activity is poised to accelerate meaningfully in the 2025-26 timeframe given current indications of interest from customers,” Eric Blashford, CEO of Broadwind Energy, said on a Tuesday earnings call.

He cited Wood Mackenzie and other energy analytics firms as supporting this view. Woodmac, for example, forecasts the US wind market to more than double from 6.7GW this year to 13.7GW in 2026 with most volume onshore.

Broadwind has commercial relationships for onshore wind towers in the US with GE Vernova, Nordex, and Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy.

At rival Arcosa, CEO Antonio Carillo said his company is in discussions with customers as they get more clarity on the number and size of their projects.

“Our plan is to continue ramping up our production. As I've said before, we operate at relatively low capacity still,” he recently told analysts.

“I think over the next year or so, you should see us get additional backlog,” added Carillo. “Right now, we have very good visibility into 2025. I think we have a very nice position to negotiate good agreements with our customers over the next year.”

While the sustained high-interest rate environment remains a headwind, developers are now advancing dozens of projects formerly on hold with inflation about two-thirds lower than it was when the IRA became law. The supply chain is also much more fluid now.

Also, easing uncertainty was Department of Treasury's guidance on IRA tax credit eligibility criteria which took more than a year to clarify.

IRA makes available tax credits for at least 10 years that both promote expansion of wind energy generation capacity and manufacturing of individual components including large tower pieces.

The US met between 70% and 85% of onshore wind tower supply domestically in 2022, the last year that federal data is available, with tariffs on some imports influencing the high level of domestic content, according to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

The US that year had about 12GW of conventional steel tower production capacity across eight plants, almost one-third more than 8.5GW of onshore wind capacity installed.

This year, as of August, Arcosa has plants in Iowa, New Mexico, and Oklahoma, while Broadwind has facilities in Texas and Wisconsin. With one each are CS Wind in Colorado, GRI Renewable Industries in Texas, Marmen Energy in South Dakota, and Ventower in Michigan.

Keystone Tower Systems also has a plant in Texas that produces towers using a unique tapered spiral welding process.

Blashford said lead times for towers are about six months and possibly a little bit shorter now because of faster access to steel supply. Project developers have time to order “but certainly don’t want to miss out on capacity they need.”

He added, “I would expect them to start booking orders for 2025 towards the end of 2024 into first quarter 2025.” These would be for deliveries in the fourth quarter next year into 2026.