Deutsche Bucht Monopile Foundations All In

Northland Deutsche Bucht GmbH has completed the installation of all 31 monopile foundations on the 269MW Deutsche Bucht wind farm in the German North Sea.

The milestone concludes the first phase of construction within the planned timeframe, the developer said.

“Installation work on the construction site, which is more than 100 kilometers off the coast, is a real challenge in the winter months,” Jens Poulsen, Project Director of Northland Deutsche Bucht GmbH, said.

”But thanks to the flexible and efficient work of our project team and our contract partners, we were able to install all foundations safely and on schedule.”

The next construction phase, inter-array medium-voltage cabling, is set to start this spring.

Reloading of the foundations onto the installation vessel Seajacks Scylla at the offshore base port in Cuxhaven went off without a hitch, Northland Deutsche Bucht GmbH said.

The monopiles, measuring an average of 78 metres in length, were delivered from Rostock as needed and loaded directly onto the installation vessel. The transition pieces, which measure 26 metres in height and serve as connecting elements to the 8.4MW MHI Vestas wind turbines, were transported to Cuxhaven from their production location in Spain. They were offloaded for interim storage in Cuxhaven until installation.

Further, two mono bucket foundations are to be erected in addition to the 31 monopiles during the second quarter of this year. Deutsche Bucht is the first offshore wind farm worldwide to test this foundation under commercial operating conditions.

Van Oord is responsible for the design, engineering, procurement, construction and installation of the foundations, inter-array cables, and the offshore substation, and the transport of the wind turbines. MHI Vestas is handling the installation of the turbines. The offshore wind turbines will be connected to the BorWin beta offshore converter station, which is already operating.