Severstal Steel Towers has clinched Russia’s largest-ever wind turbine tower contract: a 25.7 billion ruble (approximately $330 million) deal to supply 264 tower sets for a wind power plant under construction in the Samara region. The company was the sole bidder in the tender, which opened after a Danish turbine manufacturer withdrew from the project following sanctions imposed after 2022. The contract was awarded by a subsidiary of Forward Energo — a power generation company formerly known as PAO Fortum, whose assets were seized by the Russian state in 2023 and placed under government management.
The contract covers seven tower types and runs from June 2026 through February 2030, with commissioning to be completed by March 2034. Each tower is priced at 19.6 million rubles, excluding delivery and installation. Funding is spread across five years, with the largest tranche — 8.1 billion rubles — allocated for 2028.
The Samara wind project traces back to June 2021, when the regional government and a state-backed renewable energy investment fund agreed to build a wind power cluster with a combined capacity of 236.6 MW. The Danish turbine supplier — whose name was not disclosed — backed out of its obligations after sanctions took effect, turning the project into a fully domestic undertaking. Forward Energo came under Russian government control in April 2023, when a presidential decree transferred its assets — previously owned by Finnish energy group Fortum — to the Federal Property Management Agency.
Severstal Steel Towers was established in Taganrog in 2017 by Spain’s Windar Renovables as Russia’s first wind turbine tower manufacturer, with the plant opening in 2018. Windar held a 51% stake at launch, with Rusnano, a state-owned nanotechnology investment company, and Severstal each holding 24.5%. Severstal bought out Rusnano’s share in 2021; Windar exited in 2024, transferring its stake to a Russian holding company, and the business was renamed Severstal Steel Towers LLC in March of that year. The company produced 74 tower sets in 2025 — its first run after a near-standstill in 2022–2023 — and began producing its largest tower model, standing 120 meters tall and weighing over 400 tonnes.
Russia plans to add approximately 3 GW of wind generation capacity by 2030, according to the Russian Association for Renewable Energy Development. A ban on importing wind turbine towers in government procurement, introduced in 2026, closes that segment to foreign suppliers. Wind and solar plants together supplied under 1% of Russia’s total electricity output in 2023, according to the Association.
