Statoil has made the final investment decision to build the 30 MW Hywind floating wind farm offshore Peterhead in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The developer has tapped Siemens to supply turbines for the project.
‘Our objective with the Hywind pilot park is to demonstrate the feasibility of future commercial, utility-scale floating wind farms,’ explains Irene Rummelhoff, Statoil's executive vice president for new energy solutions. ‘This will further increase the global market potential for offshore wind energy, contributing to realizing our ambition of profitable growth in renewable energy and other low-carbon solutions.’
Siemens will supply five of its SWT-6.0-154 direct-drive offshore wind turbines. The turbines will be installed on floating foundations operating in water depths between 90 and 120 meters.
In 2009, Statoil and Siemens successfully installed a prototype floating turbine at the Hywind Demo project offshore Norway. Statoil says the Hywind Scotland project, expected to be commissioned in late 2017, triggers investments of around NOK 2 billion and will realize a 60-70% cost reduction per megawatt from the Norway demo.
‘We are proud to once again be onboard the floating wind project with Statoil, and to apply the experience we gained with the first full-scale floating turbine,’ comments Morten Rasmussen, head of technology at Siemens' wind power and renewables division. ‘Hywind Scotland is another pioneering project and has the potential to become a trailblazer for future floating wind projects.’
