First turbine assembled for Equinor’s Hywind Tampen project

The first of 11 turbines bound for Equinor’s Hywind Tampen floating wind project in the Norwegian North Sea is now standing tall, ahead of installation later this year.
The 88-megawatt (MW) scheme is currently billed as the world’s largest floating wind power project, and will provide electricity for the Snorre and Gullfaks oil and gas fields.

11 substructures for the project were moved last April from the Aker Solutions yard at Stord – where the first 20 metres have been built – to a deep-water site at Dommersnes where slipforming work continued to 107.5m.

Equinor noted this was the first concrete slipforming for an offshore project on the Norwegian continental shelf since the Troll A platform was delivered in 1995.

All 11 will now be towed to Gulen for final assembly.

Meanwhile, steel anchors have been welded together at Aker Solutions’ yard in Verdal, while nacelles, blades and turbine towers have been produced in Europe and shipped to the Wergelands base in Gulen.

Equinor now plans to start towing the fully assembled wind turbines in early summer 2022 and complete the offshore work by the end of the year.

According to the state-owned energy major, average output from the finished scheme should be enough to meet around 35% of the annual electricity demand of the Snorre A and B, and Gullfaks A, B and C platforms, though in periods of higher wind speed it said this is likely to be significantly higher.