EnBW, a German electric company, has started building the 960 MW He Dreiht offshore wind farm in the North Sea. An investment of €2.4 billion is required for the project, which was given to EnBW in 2017. Once completed, it will be Germany’s largest offshore wind farm. The location of the He Dreiht offshore wind farm is around 110 km west of Helgoland and 85 km north-west of Borkum. The project will comprise 64 Vestas V236-15.0 MW wind turbines. The construction phase includes the placement of 70 m-long monopile foundations with a diameter of 9.2 m and a weight of approximately 1,350 tonnes.
The wind turbine towers will be connected by a transition piece that is installed atop each base. The project will need more than 60 ships and more than 500 people during peak building periods. The project manager, EnBW Hamburg is in charge of the work. Tugboats steered floating platforms carrying the monopiles and transition sections from Eemshaven, Netherlands, to the location.
While the wind turbines and cables are being constructed concurrently for installation in early 2025, the foundation installation will go on into the summer. Connecting the wind farm to the grid is the responsibility of TenneT, the Dutch-German grid operator. This includes two high-voltage DC export cables that are 110 km on land and 120 km underwater, as well as an offshore converter station. Buried wires will carry the electricity from Hilgenriedesiel to the Garrel/Ost converter station in Cloppenburg.
By the end of 2025, the He Dreiht offshore wind farm should be operational, with EnBW handling both the technical and economic parts of the project. Upkeep will be carried out from an Emden service base. When the wind farm is fully operating, it will provide electricity to almost 1.1 million households. A group consisting of Norges Bank Investment Management, AIP, and Allianz Capital Partners owns 49.9 per cent of the project.
