Goldwind's build-then-sell wind model broke against Argentina's chaos

The Chinese turbine maker's South American arm: developing wind farms under 20-year RenovAr power purchase agreements, then selling the parks and servicing them.

Buy wind farms cheap, run them on Goldwind turbines, sell them during construction, and live on equipment and maintenance income afterwards.

In October 2017 Goldwind bought the Loma Blanca I, II, III and VI parks and Miramar — 349MW with 20-year PPAs — for US$25 million from units of Spain's distressed Isolux Corsán. The plan was Goldwind's standard entry, as vice-general manager for South America Wu Hongfei put it: invest to open the door, show performance, then settle into pure equipment sales.

The model met reality in sequence: the 2018 exchange crisis froze the US$300 million ICBC-HSBC-Citi loan talks, and the board voted narrowly to stay, approving a US$475 million borrowing ceiling; a planned US$30 million plant to assemble 70 turbines a year collapsed with the economy; attempts to sell the parks found no buyer and a deal with PowerChina fell through; construction suspended again when pandemic lockdowns blocked parts from China; and ICBC transfers froze under August 2019 forex controls. Argentine lawmakers even referred the original purchase to federal prosecutors over alleged influence peddling.

Loma Blanca II and Miramar were generating by December 2020, with the other three parks due by February 2021 — but the business model itself failed. Goldwind could not sell turbines to other RenovAr winners, and Wu said the company would probably stop developing wind farms on its own in Argentina, returning to direct equipment sales.

The build-then-sell model depends on buyers and banks being functional; Argentina's currency crisis and forex controls removed both at once.

Even the exit hatches failed: the parks could not be sold, and the one credible buyer, PowerChina, walked.

Supply chains became a third failure mode — finished Chinese turbines could not arrive through a pandemic lockdown.

Goldwind got the assets generating and the PPAs running, but the intended profit engine — flipping parks and selling turbines to other developers — never engaged.

A business model is a stack of assumptions about a country: when the currency, the banks and the borders all move at once, the model is what breaks first.

By mid-December 2020 Loma Blanca II and Miramar were generating, with the remaining parks due by January and February 2021. Wu Hongfei said Goldwind would probably stop developing wind farms on its own in Argentina and refocus on direct equipment sales and services — the 'pure turbine development' comfort zone it had tried to graduate from.