The French Environment and Energy Management Agency (ADEME) has awarded contracts to a Quadran-led EolMed consortium and a joint venture of French group Eolfi and Chinese nuclear group CGN to pilot floating wind parks off its coast.
The contracts were awards following bidding for tender round, which was launched by ADEME in 2015 for four offshore sites including one in Brittany and three in the Mediterranean.
The tender is part of the government’s efforts to develop wind farms aimed at testing industrial-scale floating offshore wind technology.
EolMed consortium, which comprises Quadran, Idéol, and Bouygues Travaux Publics, was selected to build a 24MW floating wind farm at Gruissan, 15km off the Mediterranean coast.
Featuring Senvion-built 6.2M152 wind turbine, the project will demonstrate a pre-commercial scale viability of this new industry.
Scheduled to be completed in 2020, the project will also assess technologies and their implementation from construction/installation phase to operational and maintenance phase.
Senvion CEO Jürgen Geissinger said: "The Senvion 6.2M152 is the best fitting turbine and as a flexible company, we are happy to now also provide solutions for floating offshore projects.
“The pilot wind farm is located in Gruissan, Southern France, where, depending on the ADEME's decision, between three and four Senvion 6.2M152 turbines shall be installed.”
Meanwhile, Eolfi and CGN consortium was selected for development of four-turbine floating wind farm off the island of Groix, Brittany.
The project will feature four GE-built wind turbines while French firms DCNS and Vinci will be responsible for providing the platform.
ADEME plans to award next two contracts later this year or early next year, reported Reuters.