Picture: EEW SPCEEW Special Pipe Constructions GmbH has broken its own previous heaviest monopile record, set in July 2022, with one weighting 1,895 tonnes. The heaviest monopile in EEW’s history, it was produced at the company’s Rostock site (Germany) at the end of January and is part of the order for the 800MW Vineyard Wind 1 wind farm, which will be the first commercial offshore wind farm in the USA.
In total, EEW SPC will process over 98,000 tonnes of steel into monopiles by the summer of 2023. They will each be 9.6m in diameter and have a maximum length of 85m. Vineyard Wind 1 will be built some 15 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, and it is anticipated that the wind farm will deliver first power later this year.
EEW says the American offshore wind market is one of the most important future markets for the EEW Group. “With EEW American Offshore Structures (EEW AOS), which is located at the Paulsboro Marine Terminal in New Jersey, we can contribute to the energy transition in the USA. The facility will create around 260 jobs in the first development and manufacturing phase.”
Vineyard Wind 1 will consist of an array of 62 wind turbines, spaced 1 nautical mile apart on an east-west and north south orientation. They will be General Electric Haliade-X turbines, each capable of generating 13MW of electricity which will be collected by an offshore substation prior to being transmitted to shore. Two submarine cables will be installed along a carefully sited route from the offshore substation to the landing point onshore; they will buried up to 6ft below the seafloor using a ‘jet plow’.