Wellington's iconic Brooklyn turbine is coming down this week.

The 22 year old turbine will be removed over three days from today. It will be replaced by a new turbine with greater generation capacity in April.

Guy says Meridian is excited about welcoming the new turbine and we're sending the old one out with a short tongue in cheek 'This is your life - Brooklyn wind turbine' video staring Jeremy Wells and the Brooklyn Wind Turbine! Watch the video here.

'The current turbine has become a city icon. It is part of the cityscape and is valued by the local community and wider Wellington region. We are excited to be retaining such an important Wellington landmark and to celebrate the benefits of windy Wellington.'

Meridian Energy External Relations Manager Guy Waipara says the turbine will be dismantled and delivered via truck to its new owners Energy 3. 'The good news is that we've sold the turbine to Energy 3, a supplier and installer of turbines for smaller commercial wind farms, many of them reconditioned second hand turbines from Europe. They will recondition it and put it to work somewhere else.

Energy 3 founder Tom Cameron says the company jumped at the chance to purchase the Brooklyn wind turbine. 'We were very keen to buy the turbine for reuse rather than see it scrapped. Meridian has done a great job maintaining the turbine over the years. We're not sure where the turbine will go once it's reconditioned, but all our wind projects (past and planned) are located on private land in remote areas. While potentially being visible, the turbine, wherever it goes, will be in an area that will not be open to the public'

The new Brooklyn turbine will arrive at Wellington's CentrePort from Germany at the end of March. It'll take about three weeks to get it up and running.

In early January (week commencing 5 January), work will start to prepare the site for the new turbine, this will involve construction of a new turbine foundation.

There will be a few times during the next few months when access to mountain biking tracks and around the turbine site will be closed. But this will only be for short periods and people will be kept informed via notices on the tracks and on Meridian, Wellington City Council and Brooklyn Facebook pages.

The original Brooklyn turbine produced about 870 megawatt hours a year, while the new turbine will generate around 3,900 megawatt hours a year - enough to power around 490 average homes.

The budget to replace the turbine is $2.9m.

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