OREANDA-NEWS. The installation team for the Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm can look back on eventful weeks. The last of the in total 48 wind turbines was successfully installed over Christmas around 30 kilometers to the north of the island of Heligoland.

“We worked on the completion of the 48 wind turbines with two installation vessels at the same time and, besides the conventional rotor star installation, the rotor blades of the 6-megawatt turbines have also been attached to the hub individually for the first time at sea,” explains Marcel Sunier, Project Director for the Nordsee Ost wind farm at RWE Innogy. “We were able to successfully complete the turbine installation over Christmas after only seven months. All our attention now is on the commissioning. The goal is to connect the wind power units to the grid one by one and ensure complete operational readiness of all turbines by the coming spring. The first wind turbine has commenced trial operation in the past few days and is already feeding her green electricity into the grid.”

Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm

Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm

The installation of the 48 wind turbines took place from the base port in Bremerhaven. Like the foundations, the tower segments, nacelles and rotor blades were also stored, pre-assembled and loaded on the installation vessels “Victoria Mathias” and “Friedrich Ernestine” at the Eurogate Container Terminal.

Andreas Nauen, CEO Senvion SE: “We are very proud that we have successfully realized this joint project. With our proven technology we are able to reach 4,000 full load hours on average, making a valuable contribution to grid stability.”

6-megawatt turbines from Senvion

6-megawatt turbines from Senvion

The individual components of the 6-megawatt turbines from Senvion impress through their huge dimensions: With around 160 metres from sea level to the tip of the blade, the wind turbine stands higher than Cologne Cathedral. The nacelle has a weight of approx. 350 tonnes and the dimensions of a detached house. Inside the nacelle are the machine components like gearbox and generator. The tower consisting of two individual segments is in total over 70 metres long and weighs over 240 tonnes. The individual rotor blades are 60 metres long and weigh approx. 23 tonnes. This equates to the weight of about six fully-grown elephants.

After completion and start of commercial operations in the coming spring, the Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm will have installed power of around 295 megawatts and supply the equivalent of around 320,000 households with electricity. Equipped with the presently most powerful offshore turbines, Nordsee Ost is one of the biggest commercial wind farm projects off the German coast.