Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm is one of the largest currently in construction in Europe and is being built by RWE npower renewables.
The project is a shared investment between partners RWE Innogy, Stadtwerke München GmbH, and Siemens AG.(1) Once operational, Gwynt y Môr will have an installed capacity of 576MW. It will be capable of generating enough energy to meet the average annual energy needs of around 400,000 homes(2).
Global Marine Systems Energy Ltd., (GME) the largest independent provider of subsea power cable installation, maintenance and related engineering services worldwide has landed the first export cable at the Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm.
The cable was landed by GME’s recently launched vessel, Cable Enterprise, and is the first of four export cables to be installed at the project site. Each of the export cables are between 18km and 22km in length linking the north coast of Wales to the offshore wind farm in Liverpool Bay.
“This achievement marked a significant milestone of the project as the first cable was landed on the beach at Pensarn,” said RWE npower renewables’ Gwynt y Môr Project Director, Toby Edmonds. “We are looking forward to working closely with Global Marine Energy in the coming weeks to complete the installation of these crucial cables.”
“The first shore end went as planned, always a good sign.” said Kevin O’Donnell, Director of Projects for GME. “Cable Enterprise is an important new vessel in our fleet. The vessel is designed specifically for export cable installation and the challenging environments they bring. We are happy to see her and the team get the project off to a strong start.”
Over the next few days Cable Enterprise will make its way along the planned burial route to the second end at the offshore sub station. Once the cable is fully installed it will return to Pensarn beach to begin installing the next export cable. Unlike traditional vessels, the Enterprise is designed to ground on the beach, allowing operations to be carried out to the high water mark, seamlessly continuing the installation where shore based vehicles finish.
In total, Global Marine Energy with Cable Enterprise will lay four 132kV export cables with built in fibre optics, from onshore to two offshore substations on the Gwynt y Môr wind farm.
(1) Gwynt y Môr represents a total investment of more than EUR2 billion, shared between RWE npower renewables’ parent company RWE Innogy(60%); Stadtwerke München GmbH, Munich’s municipal utilities company (30%); and Siemens(10%).
(2) Energy predicted to be generated by the proposal is derived using wind speeds monitored in the local area. This enables a calculation to be made to estimate the average annual energy production for the site based on 160 turbines each of rated capacity 3.6 MW. The energy capture predicted and hence derived homes equivalent figures may change as further data are gathered. Equivalent homes supplied is based on an annual electricity consumption per home of 4700 kWh. This figure is supported by recent domestic electricity consumption data available from The Digest of UK Energy Statistics and household estimates and projections from the UK Statistics Authority.
Global Marine Energy, a subsidiary of Global Marine Systems Ltd., is the largest independent provider of subsea power cable installation, maintenance and related engineering services worldwide and has installed power cables on many of the leading offshore wind and transmission interconnect projects built to date. For over 160 years Global Marine has been a market leader in cable installation, operating the world’s largest fleet of cable ships and related subsea vehicles, providing cable installation maintenance and related engineering services around the world. The Global Marine Energy has main offices in the United Kingdom with resources throughout Europe, Asia Pacific and the Americas.
For further information go to: http://www.gmsel.com
