North West

Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm

Situated in the Irish Sea, just 10km off Barrow-In-Furness, Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm is a fully constructed wind facility. The wind farm comprises 30 Repower 5M wind turbines and covers an area of 8.7km².

Each wind turbine measures 160 meters above sea level, with rotors measuring 126 meters in diameter and two acres in area. The turbines weigh 661 tonnes, with towers weighing 221 tonnes, and the facility includes 41,700 m of cabling which connects the wind farm to the shore.

In addition to the offshore wind farm, an operations and maintenance facility is located on the dock-side in Barrow Harbour.

Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm generates more than 500 gigawatt hours of green electricity per year – the equivalent of the annual electricity needs of more than 100,000 UK homes – and its construction helped to secure many jobs across the UK. Throughout the construction phase project teams also looked for opportunities to make use of as many local facilities and personnel as possible, to ensure the project supported many UK contractors and services.

Vattenfall – one of Europe’s largest electricity generators – implemented the offshore project. The Vattenfall Group has approximately 34,700 employees and generates more than 166.7 TWH or electricity per year.

Commenting on the project, Vattenfall UK Country Manager, David Hodkinson, said:

“We were delighted that Vattenfall’s Ormonde offshore wind project supported employment. The delivery of the towers and turbines was not only an important development for our project, but also underlined Vattenfall’s commitment to work with suppliers to strengthen the UK supply chain for the offshore wind sector. This underpins the delivery of the planned large scale expansion of offshore wind around the UK coast.”

David added:

“We were pleased that the construction programme remained on schedule.”

Work began on the project in May 2010, with onshore construction taking place at Barrow and Heysham, where the facility is connected to the National Grid.

Once work was completed on the offshore construction, the turbines were commissioned. The turbines and towers were unloaded by Harland and Wolff and pre-assembled at the company’s yard.

Commenting on the project, Harland and Wolff’s Chief Executive Officer, Robert Cooper, said:

“We were delighted to see the first elements of this significant project arrive at the Harland and Wolff yard. This was our third offshore wind farm logistics project in four years and the largest turbines we have handled. Vattenfall are a demanding customer who requires the best; our vast facilities and experienced personnel once again demonstrated their unique flexibility and capability.

“Renewable energy secured hundreds of local jobs within H&W and within the local supply chain.”

Minister of State for Energy, Charles Hendry, added:

“We have a fantastic offshore resource in Britain and Northern Ireland which we were determined to make the most of. Using these natural resources not only helps our energy security and climate ambitions, but can boost jobs and manufacturing too.

“We are determined to see more of the supply chain investment coming to our ports and it was welcome news that Vattenfall had chosen to harness the Harland and Wolff facilities and skills for the Ormonde project.”

As Vattenfall wanted to keep all environmental disturbances to a minimum, an environmental monitoring program was undertaken throughout the construction process. In addition, a programme was also put into place to reduce disturbance to marine mammals.

Discussing the project, Vattenfall Project Manager, Matthew Green, said:

“Safely and carefully installing a 661 tonne, 153 metre wind turbine in the Irish Sea was a world class engineering achievement. I would like to thank everyone on the project for their professionalism.

“The efficient installation of these wind turbines, some of the most powerful ever installed, required us to make advances in the way we transported them to site. Never before have two turbines been assembled and transported in a single trip and we are very proud of this achievement.”

For more information about Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm or the Vattenfall Group, please visit: www.vattenfall.co.uk.

OWEC Tower AS

OWEC Tower AS, formally established in Bergen in 2004, is a technology company offering design solutions for offshore sub-structures in the renewable energy sector.

OWEC Tower AS has worked on many high profile wind farm projects and studies, including Beatrice (Scotland), Alpha Ventus (Germany), Thornton Bank II (Belgium) and Le Carnet (France). Working on the Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm project, OWEC Tower AS was responsible for the detail engineering of piles, primary and secondary steel for the WTG sub-structure and follow-up fabrication works, including the provision of all documentation needed for third party’s approval. Ormonde project was the first commercial deployment of OWEC-Quattropod® in a large-scale wind farm, where the pre-installed piles concept was proven for large offshore wind energy developments.

Bjørn Fjeld, CEO of the company, said:

“We consider ourselves a pioneer and leader within our area. OWEC-Quattropod® is our main product, a complete wind turbine substructure (transition piece and jacket foundation – four or three legs), particularly suitable for larger turbines, deeper water and demanding soil conditions.

OWEC-Quattropod® is the only wind turbine jacket foundation designed, certified and already installed on four offshore wind farm projects. It is also the only proven substructure with pre-installed piles.”

And Bjørn added:

“Through world leading technology and hands-on experience, OWEC Tower also maintains a wide and experienced network including yards, contractors and installation companies.”

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