World’s largest offshore wind farm reaches major milestone

A major construction milestone has been reached at what is to be the largest operating offshore wind farm once commissioned.

AIS data and social media posts are indicating that vessels are gathering to start the turbine installation phase at the wind farm.

Located some 89 kilometres north-east of Grimsby, the UK, the 1,386 MW Hornsea TWO will comprise 165 Siemens Gamesa 8.4 MW wind turbines scheduled to be fully commissioned in 2022.

DEME Offshore is in charge of transporting the wind turbines from Siemens Gamesa’s manufacturing and logistics hub in Hull, and installing them at the site.

AIS data and social media posts show that DEME’s jack-up vessel Sea Challenger left Hull and arrived at the installation site loaded with the first set of turbine components on Wednesday, 26 May.

The turbine installation teams will for a period of time share the installation site with the monopile foundation installation teams.

DEME is in charge of installing the wind farm’s 165 monopile foundations as well.

Our latest Hornsea TWO project update shows that as of 21 April, well over two third’s of the wind farm’s foundations had been installed.

The monopile foundations are being loaded at and transported from the Buss Terminal Eemshaven in the Netherlands and installed at the site by DEME Offshore’s Innovation and Cadeler’s Wind Orca.

Offshore construction at the site started in early October 2020, with the installation of the jacket foundation for the wind farm’s substation. The wind farm will also feature a reactive compensation station (RCS).

Hornsea TWO is being developed by Ørsted and once commissioned next year it will become the largest operating wind farm in the world, taking the mantle from the 1.2 GW Hornsea ONE.