Offshore Wind Consultants (OWC) has completed a contract with ScottishPower Renewables for the East Anglia THREE offshore wind farm. OWC supported site investigation, preliminary foundation analysis, risk appraisal and turbine layout assessment for the 1.2GW project, and found that the project has a potential for significant savings.
OWC carried out an assessment of the layout constraints across the site, assisted with the development of the overall layout of the wind turbine generators, while considering a number of variables including bathymetry, soil conditions, seabed mobility, foundation type and foundation installation.
“We understood at this stage that all foundation types were still being evaluated and we believe that by applying our newly developed engineering techniques we were able to recommend the most economical options during last summer’s site investigation campaign. Our initial analysis shows that significant savings in capex budget may be possible,” said Will Cleverly , OWC Director.
East Anglia THREE covers an area of approximately 305 square kilometres and will consist of up to 172 wind turbines.
“OWC are leaders in their field and provide advice that is both strategically relevant and technically advanced. Their support on East Anglia THREE built on previous work on the East Anglia ONE project and wider East Anglia area. This was a key benefit and is helping us to optimise our design and installation strategies,” said Luis Costa , ScottishPower Renewables’ geotechnical lead on East Anglia THREE.
ScottishPower Renewables is currently delivering the East Anglia ONE project, which has a capacity of 714MW and is due to be fully operational in 2020. The company is developing four projects in total in the area, with a capacity of 3,500MW.