World’s Largest Floating Offshore Wind Farm Officially Opens
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
Norwegian energy major Equinor, together with its partners, will inaugurate today the world’s largest floating offshore wind farm, Hywind Tampen
The story is according to Reuters.
This page on the Equinor web site, outlines the project.
Hywind Tampen is the world’s first floating wind farm built specifically to power offshore oil and gas installations, and is now supplying electricity to Equinor’s oil and gas fields Snorre and Gullfaks in the Norwegian North Sea.
With a system capacity of 88 MW it is also the world’s largest floating offshore wind farm and an important step forward in industrialising solutions and reducing costs for future offshore wind power projects.
With Hywind Tampen now operational, Equinor is now operating nearly half (47 percent) of the world’s offshore floating wind capacity.
This floating wind farm powering oil and gas fields will be the first of many.
The Lonely Wind Turbine – 17th August 2023
I took these pictures to the North of Newark on the way to Leeds.
You don’t often see an onshore single wind turbine as large as this one.
Fire On Scroby Sands Wind Turbine Self-Extinguishes, Incident Under Investigation
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
A wind turbine at the Scroby Sands offshore wind farm in the UK caught fire yesterday morning (15 August). The cause of the fire, which self-extinguished later the same day, is now being investigated.
This sort of incident doesn’t seem to be reported very often, although this one was shown prominently in this article on the BBC, which contains a video.
Able Seaton Port
Able Seaton Port has been in the news several time recently. So I looked it up on Google Maps.
These four paragraphs on the Able Seaton Port website outline the capabilities of the port.
ABLE Seaton Port (ASP) is located in the centre of the UK on the North East Coast close to the mouth of the River Tees and covers 51 hectares (126 acres) including a 10 hectare (25 acre) dry dock (currently wet) – one of the world’s largest.
It is capable of handling all types of offshore construction vessels, has significant crane capacity and quays, which have been constructed particularly to suit the requirements of the heavy fabrication industry.
Quays 10 & 11 are some of the strongest in Europe at 306m long. They are dredged to -15m chart datum and are designed with a quay loading capacity of 40T/m² with a heavy load-out pad area capable of 60T/m².
Quay 6 is a new heavy-lift quay at the northern end of the wet dock. At 60T/m² this is one of the heaviest load out quays in Europe. It’s function is to service the Brent field decommissioning project which ABLE is undertaking with partners Shell and Allseas.
Note.
The four platforms with their helipads.
Is the platform at the Northern end of the dock concerned with the Brent field decommissioning project?
There seems to be lots of components around the dock ready to be assembled into assemblies like wind turbine foundations.
As Able say this is certainly a large facility.
This second Google Map is a 3D-visualisation of the Southern three platforms.
The view has all changed now according to this news item on the Able Seaton Port, which is entitled First Campaign To Install Turbines At World’s Largest Offshore Wind Farm Is Underway.
A new vessel called Voltaire will be used to install the turbines.
This page on the Dogger Bank Wind Farm web site, is entitled Largest Jack-Up Vessel Voltaire Arrives In The UK To Build Largest Wind Farm In The World.
These are the bullet points.
- Largest offshore jack-up vessel and first seaworthy ultra-low emission installation vessel Voltaire arrives in the UK for her very first assignment on Dogger Bank Wind Farm.
- The vessel will install turbines for all three Dogger Bank Wind Farm phases, a total of 277 units of GE Renewable Energy Haliade-X offshore wind turbines.
These three paragraphs describe the assembly of the wind farm.
The largest offshore jack-up installation vessel ever built, Voltaire, has just arrived in the UK port of Able Seaton ahead of its first campaign on Dogger Bank Wind Farm.
Voltaire of Jan De Nul Group was delivered in late 2022. Since then she has been undertaking final preparations for her very first assignment, the construction of the Dogger Bank Wind Farm phases A, B and C.
In total, the vessel will be responsible for installing 277 GE Renewable Energy Haliade-X turbines. Voltaire will sail out in early July to begin installation
As in an earlier life I was writing project management software for North Sea oil and gas, I can obviously say history is repeating itself. In the 1970s offshore work got easier as cranes got bigger and now fifty years later, it looks like larger lifting capacity, is enabling the installation of larger turbines.
Crown Estate Supports Four Nature-Positive Offshore Wind Research Projects
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
The Crown Estate has revealed that it is partnering with a range of UK-wide expert bodies to launch four research projects to support nature recovery and the coexistence of offshore wind farms with marine life.
The four projects are described in these paragraphs.
The first of four projects is called Prevalence of Seabird Species and Collision Events in OWF (PrediCtOr), led by the Carbon Trust under the Offshore Renewables Joint Industry Programme (ORJIP).
It aims to develop a coordinated approach for reducing uncertainty surrounding bird collision risk and influencing factors, and therefore reducing consenting risk, at offshore wind farms.
The second project is Procellariiform Behaviour & Demographics (ProcBe), led by JNCC, which seeks to fill evidence gaps around how seabird species, such as storm petrels and Manx shearwater might interact with offshore wind farms and improve the demographic rate and population modelling approaches.
Reducing Seabird Collisions Using Evidence (ReSCUE) project, led by Natural England, is a three-and-a-half project that could improve the industry’s knowledge of seabird flight heights and collision risk with offshore wind turbines in UK waters.
And the last project, named Strategic Compensations Pilots for Offshore Wind, is led by OWIC.
Research like this will surely increase the acceptance of offshore wind power amongst conservationists.
Iberdrola Secures EUR 500 Million Loan For East Anglia Three
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
Spain-headquartered Iberdrola has secured a EUR 500 million loan from Citi, partly guaranteed by the Norwegian Export Credit Agency (Eksfin), to support the development of the 1.4 GW East Anglia Three offshore wind farm in the UK.
It certainly doesn’t seem that raising the money to build this wind farm has been difficult.
Octopus Energy To Pour Billions In Offshore Wind Globally By 2030
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
UK green energy supplier Octopus Energy Group has announced that it will invest, through its generation arm, USD 20 billion (about GBP 15 billion) into offshore wind by 2030.
These three paragraphs outline the investment.
The company said that this will go towards the generation of 12 GW of renewable electricity a year, enough to power 10 million homes.
Octopus is targeting projects across the globe, with a focus on Europe, and already has several deals in the pipeline.
It will back developers of new offshore wind farms as well as projects that are under construction operational, according to the press release.
Note.
- This is the original press release from Octopus Energy, which is entitled Making Waves: Octopus Energy To Unleash $20bn Of Investment In Offshore Wind By 2030.
- According to the press release, Octopus Energy also backs Simply Blue, a developer of innovative floating offshore wind projects, a type of offshore wind technology that taps into strong winds deeper out at sea.
- I will be interested to see how much capacity, Octopus Energy builds in the UK and how the capacity relates to their electricity sales in the UK.
Octopus Energy seem to have their tentacles into several worthwhile projects.
They will certainly need a lot of finance.
In World’s Largest Wind Farm Attracts Huge Backing From Insurance Giant, I describe Aviva’s philosophy about investing in renewable electricity infrastructure, based on an article in The Times.
I suspect other reputable companies and funds will follow Aviva’s lead. Provided, that the infrastructure is top-notch and well-managed.
Ørsted Divests Remaining Stake In London Array For EUR 829 Million
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
Ørsted has signed an agreement with funds managed by Schroders Greencoat to divest its remaining 25 per cent minority interest in the London Array offshore wind farm in the UK.
These first three paragraphs outline the deal and give Ørsted reasons.
The total value of the transaction is GBP 717 million (approximately EUR 829 million).
Ørsted originally owned 50 per cent of the project and divested an initial 25 per cent of London Array to Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) in 2014.
The company does not have operations and maintenance (O&M) responsibility at the 630 MW London Array, and as the firm only holds a minority interest, Ørsted said it considers the asset non-strategic.
Note.
- Ørsted is the world’s largest developer of offshore wind power by number of built offshore wind farms.
- Schroders Greencoat LLP is a specialist manager dedicated to the renewable energy infrastructure sector.
This is a typical transaction, which is enabled between companies in the world’s financial centres all the time.
- Company A has an asset, which generates a predictable cash flow and needs money to invest in similar assets.
- Fund B has lots of money, but needs a predictable cash flow to pay interest to its investors.
So it is not surprising, that Fund B buys the asset from Company A.
I should say that the project management computer system, that I designed; Artemis was leased to the end users.
This eased the process of funding the sales.
In later years, I seem to remember, that we took bundles of leases with companies like BAe, BP, Shell, Texaco and sold them to banks, who needed a safe investment.
Vattenfall Stops Developing Major Wind Farm Offshore UK, Will Review Entire 4.2 GW Zone
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
Vattenfall has stopped the development of the Norfolk Boreas offshore wind power project in the UK and will review the way forward for the entire 4.2 GW Norfolk Zone, the Swedish energy company revealed in its interim report.
This is the first paragraph.
The developer said that the decision to stop the project was made due to ”challenging market conditions”, adding that ”financial frameworks have not adapted to reflect the current market conditions” so far.
Vattenfall are also complaining about inflation and cost increases if up to 40 %.
I have my thoughts.
Great Yarmouth Support Base
In some ways, I find this decision to pull out strange, as it was only in March this year that Vattenfall signed a contract with Peel Ports to build a support base for their Norfolk wind farms at Great Yarmouth.
I don’t think that Peel Ports will be too bothered, as they are a well-funded company and there are plenty of wind farm proposals in the sea around Norfolk, who could use a base at Great Yarmuth.
Cable Routes And Nimbys
These Norfolk wind farms have suffered opposition from Nimbys to the cable route, that will be taking the electricity away from the coast. This may have increased the cost of delivery of the electricity to market.
An Offshore Cable Route
In January 2022, I wrote Is There A Need For A Norfolk-Suffolk Interconnector?, where I analysed the amount of energy, that will be produce in Norfolk and Suffolk.
This was my conclusion.
I believe there are a lot of possibilities, that would meet the three objectives, I stated earlier.
-
- Avoid as much disruption on the land as possible.
- Create the capacity to deliver all the energy generated to customers, either as electricity or hydrogen.
- Create an expandable framework, that would support all the wind farms that could be built in the future.
In addition, simple mathematics says to me, that either there will need to be extra capacity at both Bicker Fen and Bullen Lane substations and onward to the rest of the country, or a large electrolyser to convert several gigawatts of electricity into hydrogen for distribution, through the gas network.
Note.
- An offshore Multiple Purpose Interconnector (MPI) could be built between Bicker Fen in Lincolnshire and the Isle of Grain.
- An electrolyser could be built offshore, joined to the MPI and connected to the Bacton gas terminal.
- There could be local offshore hydrogen storage.
- Bicker Fen is connected to the Viking Link to Denmark.
- An offshore link could have its Southern end at the Isle of Grain, from where the electricity can be exported to Germany, by the NeuConnect interconnector, that is under construction.
There must be sufficient capacity, so that all energy is delivered to customers, as either electricity or hydrogen.
I’ve always favoured delivering electricity from these and other East Anglian wind farms with an offshore cable route away from the coast between perhaps Bicker Fen in Lincolnshire and the the Isle of Grain, from where the electricity can be exported to Germany, by an interconnector, that is being built.
Competition From Scotland
National Grid are improving the offshore grid between Scotland and Humberside, so perhaps Vattenfall might have a competition problem, when it comes to selling their electricity.
If you have no market for a product, then the price drops.
Is East Anglia A Bad Place To Have Surplus Electricity?
Consider.
- It should also be remembered that East Anglia has no heavy electricity users.
- There are also no substantial mountains for building large pumped-storage hydro schemes, as Scotland is proposing to do.
- The construction of Sizewell C will add more electricity to the area.
In my view the best thing to do would be to build a giant electrolyser near the Bacton gas terminal.
Was It A Mistake For Vattenfall To Make A Bid?
Looking at the delivery problems for the Norfolk wind farms, I think that Vattenfall made a bad decision to bid for them.
- The wind farms are too far North to serve London and the South-East and to export the electricity to the Continent.
- They are also too far South to serve the industry in the North around the Humber and the Tees.
It looks an obvious case of wrong Location, Location and Location.
Could Norfolk Boreas And Norfolk Viking Work Economically?
I suspect these ideas could help.
- A Multiple Purpose Interconnector (MPI) would be built between Bicker Fen in Lincolnshire and the Isle of Grain.
- The MPI would connect to any wind farms on the route.
- An offshore electrolyser opposite Bacton would be connected to the MPI to use surplus electricity to generate hydrogen, which would be distributed through the gas grid.
The whole network of wind farms, interconnectors, electrolysers and storage needs to be comprehensively designed, so that it provides the South-East corner of England, with enough reliable electricity and hydrogen.
The Anonymous Widower 