Flender drives sustainability forward with new logistics hall at its Voerde site

15.06.2023

Drive manufacturer Flender has officially completed construction work on the expansion of its site in Voerde/Germany, with the opening of its new logistics and storage hall for the assembly of large gear units. The hall has been built on an open area on the company's premises covering almost 8000 m². The new building is part of Flender's investments to be able to handle the expected growth in the global wind energy business and to drive the energy transition in Europe. In addition to large components for wind power gearboxes, the logistics hall also serves the industrial business of the global drive specialist.

Flender Managing Director Andreas Evertz (6^th from right) opens the logistics hall together with Site Manager Mark Zundel (7^th from right), Head of Flender Real Estate NRW Markus Ritte (9^th from right) and further employees
© Flender

The new hall is part of a logistics concept that includes the lease of another hall with around 10 000 m² directly next to the Flender site and was developed according to the standards of sustainable manufacturing. Flender CEO Andreas Evertz: "With the new storage areas, we are making our logistics processes sustainable and thus reducing a considerable part of the previous transport routes and the associated CO₂ emissions. Components that were previously stored de-centrally can now be stored centrally and made available for assembly more quickly with optimized transport routes. The energy for the large parts washing machine comes from district heating. Having short material routes, the gearbox parts can be transported directly from the truck to the large gear unit assembly via a roofed airlock. This means that the hall does not cool down and we save valuable energy. In addition, we will equip the entire roof of the new hall with photovoltaic modules. With measures like these, we have already been able to reduce our CO₂ emissions by 79 % in recent years and are getting closer step by step to our goal of operating on a completely CO₂-neutral basis."

Among other things, gear components for wind energy are prepared for assembly in the hall, which was still almost empty on the picture
© Flender

Among other things, gear components for wind energy are prepared for assembly in the hall, which was still almost empty on the picture

Markus Ritte, Head of Flender Real Estate NRW, adds: "We are proud to have completed the construction project within twelve months, despite material bottlenecks and the current challenges in the supply chains. When selecting the collaborating companies, we deliberately opted for regional partners in order to drive sustainability forward here as well." In addition to storage areas, the new building, which is 200 m long and 40 m wide, is home to goods receiving, incoming goods inspection and a cleaning area with a large parts washing machine.