DEME Installs Vineyard Wind 1 Offshore Substation, First in US | Offshore Wind - Offshore WIND
DEME Installs Vineyard Wind 1 Offshore Substation, First in US | Offshore Wind
DEME Installs Vineyard Wind 1 Offshore Substation, First in US
DEME’s specialised floating installation vessel Orion has installed the offshore substation for the 800 MW Vineyard Wind 1 wind farm, a first in the US, said the Belgium-based company.
With a weight of more than 3,500 tonnes, this was the single heaviest lift of the entire construction campaign, according to Vineyard Wind, a joint venture between Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) and Avangrid.
The offshore substation left the quay at Bladt Industries’ production site in Southern Denmark in May and headed for its destination 35 miles from mainland Massachusetts.
Bladt handled the steel manufacturing of the substation. Design and engineering were carried out by Semco Maritime and ISC, and installation of the electrical system was also carried out by Semco Maritime.
After the installation of the offshore substation, Semco Maritime and Bladt Industries will now take over and begin work on the offshore commissioning during the summer.
Array cables from the 62 Haliade-X 13 MW wind turbines will connect to the offshore substation. From there, the renewable energy will be aggregated and routed onshore through two export cables to power 400,000 homes across Massachusetts.
DEME said it will continue with the installation of the 62 wind turbines, a campaign that kicked off back in May.
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Its vessel, Orion, installed the first monopile foundation last month, during which Vineyard Wind deployed the offshore support vessels (OSV) Atlantic Oceanic and the Northstar Navigator to deploy a primary and secondary bubble curtain which is designed to absorb and dampen sound throughout the foundation installation.
Vineyard Wind 1, the first commercial-scale offshore wind farm in the US, is located 15 miles (24 kilometres) off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard and is planned to start producing power this year.
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Related Knowledge Center: Offshore wind energy
Over the next decade, U.S. offshore wind power is expected to grow from a single 30-megawatt wind farm off Rhode Island to more than 2,000 MW of capacity along the Atlantic Seaboard. There are contracts for wind power off the coasts of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Maryland, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Virginia.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has estimated the United States has over 4,000 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind potential, enough to power the country four times over.
The growth in part being spurred by state solicitations, including in New York, where then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) set a commitment of 9,000 MW of offshore wind by 2035, and in Connecticut, where in June 2021, Gov. Ned Lamont (D) signed legislation authorizing the construction of 2,000 MW of offshore wind by 2030.
The offshore development is also being driven by an investment tax credit set to end in December 2019 and is equal to 12 percent of expenditures. U.S. Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Tom Carper (D-Del.) have introduced a bill to extend the tax credit for up to eight years.
The Interior Department has held eight competitive lease sales that resulted in 15 offshore wind leases over 1.7 million acres that has the potential for 21 GW of capacity. In February 2022, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management completed a bidding process that realized $4.37 billion for 488,000 acres across six lease areas in federal waters off New York and New Jersey.
Projects have also been proposed off the Southeast coast, off California and Hawaii, and for the Great Lakes.