GE Renewable Energy to hire more than 200 employees for its Wind Turbine Blade Factory in Cherbourg, France

• GE Renewable Energy plans to recruit more than 200 employees at its wind turbine blade factory in France, before the end of 2019
  
• Located in Cherbourg, the factory recruited 120 employees in 2018, and will reach more than 320 employees at the end of this year
  
• 60 people out of 200 have recently been recruited and just began intensive training at the factory's 'Center of Excellence'
  

GE Renewable Energy announced its plan to recruit more than 200 employees at its LM Wind Power wind turbine blade manufacturing site in Cherbourg, France. 60 out of the additional employees were recently recruited and just began intensive training at the factory's 'Center of Excellence'.

Opened in April 2018, the Cherbourg facility became the first wind turbine blade manufacturing site in France. A year later, the site counted 120 employees, 34 percent of whom are women.

Prototyping phase began in January 2019, when the teams started the production of five 107-meters blades, the largest in the world, set to be installed on GE's Haliade-X 12 MW offshore wind turbine, the most powerful one to date. While, in Saint-Nazaire, France, GE is producing the Haliade-X's nacelles. Two blades will be shipped to testing facilities, and three will be assembled to the Haliade-X prototype site in Rotterdam. The expanded production workforce will allow LM Wind Power to prepare the blades commercial production phase.

"A significant part of the employees at our site today are from the region of Normandy" said Erwan Le Floch, the site Director. "We are proud to take part in the region's social and economic development, and we are happy to create more jobs in the surrounding community this year."

Mostly looking for production workforce, the positions are open to all profiles and backgrounds, as every new employee will be trained to manufacture wind turbine blades through LM Wind Power's 'Center of Excellence' training program. Each new employee will receive a six-week theoretical and practical training course, founded on a permanent search for excellence, which will provide skilled and technical expertise, and improve the quality of products and therefore the satisfaction of our customers. Newcomers will also be mentored by experts from the company's sites worldwide. The site will also be looking for production supervisors, quality controllers, logistic and maintenance technicians, as well as apprentices' positions.

"This project creates enthusiasm as the factory is ramping-up, and we have witnessed a significant combination of efforts as we use the expertise from our facilities worldwide to train the people in Cherbourg" says Lukasz Cejrowski, LM 107.0 P Project Manager, "The teams are excited to have produced the first blade in the world longer than 100 meters. We are welcoming new people with diverse backgrounds, and at the same time, we are building a new blade of a size we have never achieved before."

About LM Wind Power
LM Wind Power, a GE Renewable Energy Business, is a world leading designer and manufacturer of rotor blades for wind turbines, with a global manufacturing footprint that includes blade factories in Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, India, Poland, Spain, France, Turkey and the United States. The company has produced more than 215,000 blades since 1978, corresponding to more than 102 GW installed capacity and global savings of 212 million metric tons of CO2 annually. In 2018, LM Wind Power became the first carbon neutral business in the wind industry.
Follow us at www.lmwindpower.com or on Twitter @lmwindpower

About GE Renewable Energy
GE Renewable Energy is a $15 billion business which combines one of the broadest portfolios in the renewable energy industry to provide end-to-end solutions for our customers demanding reliable and affordable green power. Combining onshore and offshore wind, blades, hydro, storage, utility-scale solar, and grid solutions as well as hybrid renewables and digital services offerings, GE Renewable Energy has installed more than 400+ gigawatts of clean renewable energy and equipped more than 90 percent of utilities worldwide with its grid solutions. With nearly 40,000 employees present in more than 80 countries, GE Renewable Energy creates value for customers seeking to power the world with affordable, reliable and sustainable green electrons.
Follow us at www.ge.com/renewableenergy, on www.linkedin.com/company/gerenewableenergy, or on www.twitter.com/GErenewables

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