Westermost Rough Wind Farm

Westermost Rough Wind Farm is an offshore wind farm 8 kilometres (5 mi) north east of Withernsea off the Holderness coast, in the North Sea, England. The farm covers an area of approximately 35 km2 (14 sq mi) with a generation capacity of approximately 210 MW. It became operational in May 2015.

Westermost Rough Wind Farm
Westermost Rough visible on the horizon, under construction in March 2015
CountryEngland, United Kingdom
Location8 km (5 mi) north-east of Withernsea, East Riding of Yorkshire
Coordinates53.805°N 0.149°E / 53.805; 0.149
StatusOperational
Construction began2014
Commission dateMay 2015
Owner(s)Ørsted
Wind farm
TypeOffshore
Site area35 km2 (14 sq mi)
Power generation
Units operational35
Make and modelSiemens 6 MW
Nameplate capacity210 MW
External links
CommonsRelated media on Commons

History

The Westermost Wind farm site was originally awarded to Total in 2003 during the initial Round 2 wind farm tendering process; Total later withdrew and the concession was returned to the Crown Estate in 2006.[1] In 2007 DONG Energy was awarded a lease from The Crown Estate to develop a wind farm at Westermost Rough.[2] The company Westermost Rough Ltd was established 2007;[n 1] a subsidiary of DONG Energy.[3]

A planning application was submitted in November 2009,[4] and consent was given by the Department of Energy and Climate Change in 2011 for a development of up to 80 turbines of up to 245 MW power with a limit of 172 m (564 ft) turbine tip height, and 150 m (490 ft) rotor diameter, as well as associated onshore and offshore substations, cabling and other infrastructure.[5]

Initial expectations were for an earliest in service date of 2014,[4] in January 2013 construction of the wind farm was confirmed, with construction scheduled to start in 2014 with the farm operational by 2015.[6][7][8]

DONG Energy sold a 50% stake in the wind farm in equal parts to the Green Investment Bank and to Marubeni Corporation for a total of £240 million; as part of the sale the two buyers committed to investing £500 million in the construction of the wind farm;[9] the two companies, through the joint company WMR JV Investco Limited secured £370 million from lenders in August 2014 to fund the capital cost of the project.[10][11]

Design, manufacture and construction

The wind farm is located 8 km (5 mi) off the Holderness coast, roughly northeast of Withernsea.[n 2] The proposed design is for 35 to 80 turbines of between 3 and 7 MW power output, in an area of 35 km2 (14 sq mi), with a total installed capacity of up to 245 MW.[12]

The offshore substation design was subcontracted to Ramboll,[13] with medium voltage turbine to offshore transformer submarine cables supplied by Nexans.[14] High voltage 155 kV submarine export cables and 155/275 kV underground cables were contracted to be supplied from LS Cable & System of Korea.[15][16] The cable landing point is to be near Tunstall, East Riding of Yorkshire, with a national grid connection made via the buried cables to a new substation at Salt End.[17]

The project was the first commercial use of gearless 6 MW Siemens Wind turbines;[18][19] 35 turbines were to be installed, giving a capacity of 210 MW.[20] Varde, Denmark based Titan Wind Energy was contracted to supply towers, with tower foundations supplied by Bladt Industries of Aalborg, Denmark.[21] The driven monopile foundations are 6.25 metres (20.5 ft) diameter with mass up to 800 t, with 425 t transition pieces.[22]

A dual Doppler radar system, (originally developed by the US National Wind Institute,[23][24] and supplied by SmartWind Technologies, LLC.[25]) was used to measure high-density wind details over the large wind farm area, with the experiment supported by the Carbon Trust organisation.[26][27]

GeoSea was awarded the contract to install foundation piles in April 2013.[28] The first foundation pile was installed in February 2014.[29] In early 2014 residents of Withernsea and the nearby area reported noise and vibration disturbance during the night time, attributed to piling at the wind farm site; by April 2014 an investigation by the Marine Management Organisation had found evidence of noise, but the results were not conclusive enough for it to act on.[30] Foundation installation was completed by May 2014,[31] and the offshore substation installed by June 2014.[32] Turbine installation was completed March 2015.[33]

Operations

The wind farm was commissioned and became operational in May 2015.[34]

In May 2015, Ofgem awarded preferred bidder status to own and operate the electrical transmission assets of the wind farm to Transmission Capital Partners;[35] in early 2016 the sale of the assets (TC Westernmost Rough OFTO Ltd.) to a consortium of Transmission Capital Partners Limited Partnership and International Public Partnerships Limited was completed.[36] In early 2016 CWind was given a 20-year contract to maintain the TC Westernmost Rough OFTO's electrical transmission assets.[37]

In 2017, DONG Energy rebranded themselves as Ørsted as the acronym for DONG Energy - Danish Oil & Natural Gas - was seen as inappropriate for a company which had divested its entire oil and gas operations and was building an energy portfolio that was approaching 100% renewable.[38]

Notes
  1. Westernmost Rough Limited, incorporated 1 May 2007, company number 0623914. Source: Companies House database
  2. Boundaries of the wind farm are at grid locations 53°50.5754′N 00°09.6150′E, 53°47.9824′N 00°12.7432′E, 53°46.1311′N 00°08.3651′E, 53°48.7222′N 00°05.2348′E, and 53°50.5754′N 00°09.6150′E. (London Gazette, 18 June 2012)

References
  1. Hjelmstad, Per, "DONG Energy's internationale Havmølleaktiviteter" (PDF), Dansk Vindkraftkonference 2008 (in Danish), DONG Energy, Westermost Rough, p.11, retrieved 26 September 2012
  2. THE CROWN ESTATE AWARDS WESTERMOST ROUGH OFFSHORE WINDFARM SITE TO DONG ENERGY, Crown Estate, 24 May 2007, retrieved 26 September 2012
  3. Westermost Rough non technical summary (October 2009), "Introduction"
  4. Time Schedule, DONG Energy, archived from the original on 20 January 2011, retrieved 26 September 2012
  5. Sources:
  6. Time Schedule, DONG Energy, archived from the original on 27 June 2013, retrieved 26 September 2012
  7. "Westermost Rough offshore wind farm to be built", BBC News Humberside, 30 January 2013, retrieved 30 January 2014
  8. "Westermost Rough offshore wind farm to be built", Grimsby Telegraph, 31 January 2013, retrieved 30 January 2014
  9. Marubeni Corporation and UK Green Investment Bank to become co-owners of DONG Energy's Westernmost Rough offshore wind farm (Press release), DONG Energy, 31 March 2014, retrieved 24 April 2014
  10. "Project Financing Agreement for the 210MW Westermost Rough Offshore Wind Power Project", www.marubeni.com, 11 August 2014, retrieved 11 August 2014
  11. "GIB, Marubeni rejig Rough cash", renews.biz, 11 August 2014, retrieved 11 August 2014
  12. About Westermost Rough, DONG Energy, archived from the original on 20 January 2011, retrieved 26 September 2012
  13. "SUBSTATION DESIGN FOR WESTERMOST ROUGH OFFSHORE WIND FARM", www.ramboll.com, Ramboll, retrieved 26 September 2012
  14. Nexans delivers medium-voltage submarine cables for Westermost Rough wind farm, Nexans, 25 January 2013, retrieved 30 January 2014
  15. LS Cable & System, first in Korea to enter European submarine cable market, LS Cable & System, 5 February 2013, retrieved 31 January 2014, LS Cable & System announced on the 5th the supply of 150kV level submarine cables, 150kV&275kV extra high-voltage underground cable and connection materials to a scale of 16 million Euros (approx. KRW 23 billion) to Dong Energy, [... to] be used in an offshore wind power generation complex to be built in Westermost Rough on the Southeastern Coast of the U.K. [...] the extra high-voltage underground cables will be used to transmit electric energy [...] to an inland transmission site.
  16. Carr, David (5 February 2013), "LS Cable & System wins €16m cable contract from Dong", www.windpoweroffshore.com, retrieved 31 January 2014
  17. Westermost Rough non technical summary (October 2009), "The Project", p.4; also "Summary of Onshore Environmental Impact Assessment", p.16
  18. Blackwell, Ben, "Dong's Westermost Rough first in line for Siemens 6MW roll out", www.rechargenews.com, retrieved 26 September 2012
  19. Wittrup, Sanne (15 August 2014), Så er den første af Siemens' kæmpemøller rejst til havs (in Danish), Ingeniøren, retrieved 19 February 2015
  20. "UK: DONG to Build Westermost Rough Offshore Wind Farm", www.offshorewind.biz, 30 January 2013, retrieved 30 January 2013
  21. Miller, Ben (28 November 2013), "Titan Wind Energy to supply towers for Westermost Rough", www.windpoweroffshore.com, retrieved 30 January 2014
  22. "Engineering works for the Westermost Rough Offshore Wind Farm", www.twd.nl, archived from the original on 1 February 2014, retrieved 31 January 2014
  23. D. Hirth, Brian; Schroeder, John L.; Scott Gunter, W.; Guynes, Jerry G. (March 2015), "Coupling Doppler radar-derived wind maps with operational turbine data to document wind farm complex flows", Wind Energy, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 18 (3): 529–540, doi:10.1002/we.1701
  24. Measuring the Complex Flows Found in Wind Plants, Texas Tech University, retrieved 9 June 2015
  25. "Carbon Trust backs Dong radar trial", renews.biz, 11 March 2015, retrieved 4 February 2016
  26. Wittrup, Sanne (19 February 2015), Radarsystem fra Dong skal øge havmøllers strømproduktion (in Danish), Ingeniøren, retrieved 19 February 2015
  27. Snieckus, Darius (19 February 2015), "Dong to test dual-Doppler wind radar at Westermost Rough", rechargenews.com, retrieved 19 February 2015
  28. "GeoSea bags Rough and Borkum", renews.biz, 12 April 2013, retrieved 30 January 2014
  29. "Smooth start at Westermost Rough", renews.biz, 25 February 2014, retrieved 24 April 2014
  30. Sources:
  31. "Foundations done at Westermost", renews.biz, 27 May 2014, retrieved 27 May 2014
  32. "Westermost substation takes stage", renews.biz, 3 June 2014, retrieved 5 June 2014
  33. "Dong completes set at Westermost", renews.biz, 30 March 2015, retrieved 30 March 2015
  34. "Westermost Rough hits full power", reNEWS - Renewable Energy News, retrieved 9 June 2015
  35. "TCP snares Westermost grid", renews.biz, 15 May 2015, retrieved 15 May 2015
  36. "Westermost grid sale agreed", renews.biz, 4 February 2016, retrieved 4 February 2016
  37. "CWind grabs Westermost gig", renews.biz, 15 February 2016, retrieved 15 February 2016
  38. "DONG Energy becomes Ørsted on 6 November". www.dongenergy.co.uk. Retrieved 15 December 2017.

Sources
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