RWE and Abu Dhabi-based Masdar have appointed Dutch geo-data specialist company, Fugro, to carry out geotechnical seabed surveys at the Dogger Bank South (DBS) offshore wind project sites in the UK.
Located over 100 kilometers off the northeastern coast of England, the DBS offshore wind farm will be split across two sites, DBS East and DBS West, each with a capacity of 1.5 GW and spanning 500 square kilometers.
Three vessels, Fugro Quest, Fugro Voyager, and Normand Mermaid, will survey the ground conditions below the seabed from June to October 2024 at the location of each proposed turbine and platform foundation, and associated seabed infrastructure.
The ground investigation will use a combination of Cone Penetration Tests (CPT) and sampling boreholes and will be an extensive geotechnical campaign for one of the world’s largest offshore wind projects.
According to a social media post by RWE, the findings from the seabed surveys will give the developers a detailed and accurate picture of the ground conditions which will help them in designing the optimal foundations and array cables for the sites.
RWE entered into agreements for lease for the DBS projects with the Crown Estate in January 2023.
Construction on the projects could start as early as the end of 2025, with the first 800 MW of electricity planned to come online in 2029.
Based on an estimated combined capacity of approximately 3 GW, once fully commissioned, DBS could provide green electricity for the equivalent of about three million UK homes.
This is not the first time Fugro will carry out surveys at DBS sites. In 2022, the company performed surveys at the array sites and export cable routes of RWE and Masdar’s DBS East and DBS West projects.