Construction work on the 588MW Beatrice offshore wind farm has now been completed, following the installation and commissioning of all the 84 wind turbines.
Image: Construction completed at Beatrice offshore wind farm. Photo: Courtesy of doskey12/Pixabay.
Located 13km off the coast from Caithness, Beatrice wind farm is powered by 84 of Siemens Gamesa’s 7MW wind turbines. The total green electricity generated from the wind farm is enough to power more than 450,000 Scottish homes annually.
Each of the turbines at the Scottish wind farm is 188m from the sea level to blade tip, standing taller than the London Eye. The wind farm is also claimed to be the largest offshore wind farm in the world to have used jacket foundations. Each of these jackets weigh nearly 1,000 tonnes and were installed at water depths of over 56m.
The Beatrice Offshore Windfarm Limited (BOWL) is a joint venture development between SSE Renewables with 40% stake, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners with 35% stake and Red Rock Power Limited with the remaining 25% stake.
As the majority shareholder, SSE Renewables has taken the responsibility of the wind farm’s construction process and will also provide operations and maintenance services.
SSE Renewables managing director Jim Smith said: “Completing the offshore construction at Beatrice is a testament to the capabilities of SSE Renewables and our project partners. Delivering one of Scotland’s largest ever private investments on time and under budget is a fantastic achievement given its complexity and we would like to thank everyone who has helped us make the project a reality.”
The wind farm is claimed to have been built at a cost of £2.6bn, with £1.1bn being spent in the UK and around half of this amount in Scotland. The expenditure included CS Wind for making turbine towers, Global Energy Group for marshalling and turbine pre-assembly, Bi-Fab in Fife and on Lewis for jacket foundations and piles, Babcock Marine to produce Offshore Transformer Module topsides, JDR Cables to supply array cables and Siemens Gamesa for blade manufacturing.
The transmission system for the offshore wind farm will be supplied by a consortium of Siemens Transmission and Distribution and Nexans.
Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners senior partner Christina Grumstrup Sørensen said: “Achieving this final milestone in the construction phase of Beatrice in a safe and timely manner is a result of the excellent performance of the project team and the good cooperation with competent suppliers. We are very pleased to see all 84 turbines feeding green, renewable electricity into the grid.
“This is a major milestone in our offshore wind strategy, where we are developing, constructing and operating offshore wind projects globally.”