Europe | October 21, 2021

World’s largest offshore substation installed at Hornsea Two

UK: Two major milestones have been hit on Ørsted’s Hornsea Two offshore wind farm, with 165 wind turbine foundations and the in-zone substation installed.

 

Image source: BusinessLive

UK: Two major milestones have been hit on Ørsted’s Hornsea Two offshore wind farm, with 165 wind turbine foundations and the in-zone substation installed.

Located 89 km off the Yorkshire coast, it will take the world-leading title from ‘little’ sister Hornsea One when complete, bringing a further 1.4 GW of capacity to the UK electricity network. The substation is the largest of its kind ever installed, weighing around 8,000 T. It was lifted into position by the vessel Sleipnir.

Also onsite is the reactive compensation station, which will be lifted into place in the coming days. Together, they have a combined weight of 10,200 T and have just completed their 8,500 nautical mile journey from Sembcorp Marine’s facility in Singapore.

“It has been a very busy and exciting time for everyone involved in the project. These twin milestones, together with the completion of our export cable circuits, mark the culmination of a truly monumental scope of work involving multiple teams from numerous companies working together in the face of some significant challenges over the last 18 months. The completion of the foundation installations marks the end of half a million hours’ work, achieved on a challenging timetable and most importantly with an outstanding safety record throughout. These are very complex operations and major engineering achievements, delivered thanks to the dedication, professionalism and positivity of the whole project team and we are all delighted that we have completed these significant milestones along the road to having the wind farm fully up and running in 2022,” said Patrick Harnett, programme director for Hornsea Two at Ørsted.

Spanning an offshore area of 462 km2, it will be Orsted’s 13th in UK waters, a $17.9 B (£13 B) investment that will see it supply more than 7 % of the UK’s electricity.

 

Source: BusinessLive