Sharing knowhow in offshore wind construction

Offshore wind energy gets busy on the Humber

By Andy Reay, A2SEA Regional Manager for the UK

The Humber may not be that long as rivers go (just 59 kilometres from one end to the other), but its lack of length isn’t about to stop it being one of the busiest spots in offshore wind energy next year. In fact, the area will be home to both operations & maintenance projects, as well as considerably more offshore construction, too.

Actually, the Humber isn’t a river at all. Situated on the east coast of northern England and flowing into the North Sea, it’s a tidal estuary formed where the River Trent and the River Ouse meet each other. In 2017, for the first time, A2SEA will be bringing two jack-up vessels to the area, kicking off two new projects that will see components being loaded out from Siemens’ new £160 million turbine blade manufacturing, project construction, assembly and service facility at Green Port Hull.

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Turbine installation and the levelised cost of energy: Bigger vessel payloads

By Hans Peter Johannsen, Vice President, Projects.

This is the third article in our series about reducing the LCoE in the offshore wind industry through optimising turbine loading, transport and installation.

A2SEA’s internal data supports wider industry observations that the cost of turbine installation per installed MW is, in fact, coming down. From our perspective (and remembering that turbine installation is a minor part of an wind farm’s overall development), there are gains to be made whenever we can load more megawatts at a time onto our vessels. This ability is strongly assisted by the increasing amount of power generated by larger turbines such as the MHI Vestas 8 MW. But that’s far from the full story.

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