Ørsted and Jan De Nul Group have installed the first foundation for the Borkum Riffgrund 3 offshore wind farm, near the German coast.
Manufactured by Steelwind in Nordenham and at Bladt Industries A/S’ Lindø Denmark plant, the Borkum Riffgrund 3 foundations are up to 100 m long and weigh up to 1,500 tons. Jan De Nul Group’s heavy-lift vessel Les Alizés installed the first of 83 monopile foundations at 53 km off Borkum island. Next year, a new generation of offshore wind turbines, the SG 11.0-200 DD, will be installed on these foundations.
“With Borkum Riffgrund 3, we are setting new standards for our industry – both in terms of capacity and business model,” says Ørsted’s Jörg Kubitza. “The new project is the first offshore wind farm in Germany to be built that was awarded with a bid of 0 euro per MWh in the offshore wind tenders. This enables us to directly support our corporate customers with their decarbonization. This is only possible on this scale using renewable energies through offshore wind energy.”
Borkum Riffgrund 3 is the first Ørsted wind farm in Germany to be built without an offshore substation. The new connection concept, which is being implemented together with transmission system operator TenneT, provides a direct connection of the wind turbines via 66 kV export cables to the DolWin5 offshore converter platform from TenneT.
This installation campaign started immediately after the last monopile foundation for the Gode Wind 3 project was in place.Together with Gode Wind 3, Borkum Riffgrund 3 will have a total capacity of more than 1.1 GW, almost doubling Ørsted’s installed Germany offshore wind power capacity to approximately 2.5 GW. The two wind farms are expected to be commissioned next year and in 2025, respectively.
At 913 MW, Borkum Riffgrund 3 will be the largest wind farm in German waters to date, says Ørsted.
