Effective works Phase 2 - 3
2011 : week 28
Due to bad weather conditions works offshore were held up whole week
Fabrication and assemblage of the steel structures for the Jacket foundations are ongoing at different yards all over the world, (Belgium-Netherlands-United Kingdom-Poland-Germany-Spain-South Korea)
All seabed preparations by dredging at the locations of the foundations are complete for phase II and for phase III of the project
The pile driving works started in area B of the windfarm on Wednesday 6th of April 2011. Steel piles of 40 to 50 m are driven into the seabed by a hammer installation mounted on the jack up platform Buzzard. These so called "pin-piles" are the anchors to seal the jacket foundations into the seabed.The length of the piles depends on the soil conditions.To assure the correct locations of the piles a template is lowered onto the seabed.
The pin-piles for the foundation of the offshore transformer station are already driven.
In area B all the pin-piles are driven and in area A 33% of the pin-piles are complete
The vessel Pompeï is mobilised for the dredging and the cleaning of the pin-piles. After these works pin-pile covers are installed on the piles
The transportation barge Stemat 87 was loaded on 7/06/2011 at the fabrication yard Smulders in Hoboken with the first jacket foundation and was towed by the Motortug Westsund to the Thortonbank
The Heavy Lift Vessel "Rambiz" installed the first jacket foundation in area B on Sunday 12/06/2011 and on Tuesday 14/06/2011 this foundation was grouted to the pin-piles.Today 4 foundations out of the 24 for area B are installed.
The 33 kV infield cables, making the future connection between the wind turbines, are in production in Karlskrona, Sweden.The pick up of these cables for transport to the work site is scheduled for July 23th 2011.The cables will be loaded on the cable lay vessel CS Sovereign by July the 25th.Arrival of the ship at the Thorntonbank expected by August the 3th.
In view of the infield cable laying preparatory works are carried out, amoung them: rock dumping as scour protection around the offshore transformer station foundation and GOSA mattresses installations above existing underground cables as protection against future cable crossings.A pre-grapnel run will be carried out to remove obstacles from the cable trajectories
The steelstructure of the Offshore Transformer Station is in erection in the workyard of HSM Schiedam, Netherlands.
Repower, the contractor for the wind turbines, started purchasing parts of the wind turbines.Following anticipated production start dates have been announced by REpower:the towers by AMBAU-Cuxhaven Germany from September 2011, the blades by LM Glasfiber Holding Denmark from August 2011, the generators by VEM Germany from October 2011 and the gearboxes by 2 constructors, WINERGY-Vörde Germany from August 2011 and HANSEN-Belgium from October 2011.
Directional drillings are executed on land for the 150 kV cable laying onshore which is about to start half of September this year