The NHV Group has won a contract with Seaway Heavy Lifting (SHL) to provide helicopter services in support of their upcoming wind farm construction project at the Beatrice offshore wind farm in the Scottish North Sea.
The 588MW, 84 turbine wind farm, will be situated in the Outer Moray Firth. In May 2016, Seaway Heavy Lifting and Subsea 7 won an engineering, procurement, construction and installation (EPCI) contract for Beatrice’s turbine foundations and array cables.
NHV’s operations are expected to start in the second quarter of 2017 and last for 18 months. Flights will depart from the company’s base in Aberdeen to the Beatrice wind farm, which is approximately 80 nautical miles from Aberdeen.
The company will support this project utilizing the H175 aircraft, an Airbus Helicopter’s Super Medium type specifically designed to meet evolving mission needs in the energy sector.
NHV started operating out of Aberdeen at the beginning of 2016 and announced the opening of a new hangar, apron and passenger handling facilities last October.
“We are very happy to announce the strengthening of our long standing partnership with Seaway Heavy Lifting and support them in the construction of the new Beatrice Offshore wind farm project. Our brand new facilities and aircraft will offer a fantastic platform for them to support their operations in the Moray Firth over the next 18 months,” NHV’s base manager Jamie John said.
The GBP 2.6 billion Beatrice Offshore Windfarm Ltd (BOWL) project has been given the green light for construction by owners SSE (40%), Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) (35%) and Red Rock Power Limited (25%) after reaching financial close on 23 May 2016.