The Seafox 5 jack-up rig has installed the tower and the nacelle of the first GE Haliade 6MW wind turbine on the 396MW Merkur offshore wind farm in the German North Sea.
Seafox 5 loaded the first turbine components at the port of Eemshaven in the Netherlands. The jack-up left the port on 22 February and arrived at the installation site some 45km north of the island of Borkum the following day.
In total, Seafox will install 66 GE Haliade 6MW turbines on the wind farm.
The nacelles are being produced at GE’s Saint-Nazaire factory in France, and then shipped to Eemshaven, where they are prepared for installation at the offshore site.
The blades are made in Castellon in Spain by LM Wind Power, and the towers are manufactured in Germany and China.
Merkur is expected to be completed by the end of 2018, and fully commissioned in 2019.
The owner and developer of the wind farm is Merkur Offshore GmbH, a joint venture between Partners Group, InfraRed Capital Partners, DEME Concessions and Coriolis.