RWE Innogy UK announced that it has successfully completed the installation of all 160 foundations at the world’s second largest wind farm, Gwynt y Môr, off of North Wales.
Gwynt y Môr is a greater than US$3.36 billion offshore wind farm on schedule to become fully constructed this year, and will be capable of generating enough energy from renewable sources to power the equivalent of about 400,000 homes - around a third of the total number of homes in all of Wales.
“Foundations consist of a monopile and a transition piece and the first of these was installed on 8th August 2012, using the heavy lift vessel, Stanislav Yudin," RWE Innogy UK’s Gwynt y Môr’s Project Director, Toby Edmonds said. "Since then a number of other vessels, including the Friedrich Ernestine, have joined the project to carry out foundation installation activity which is always a technically challenging part of the construction process. With this achievement behind us we can focus on installing the final 19 turbines, commissioning the entire array and bringing on line a highly capable renewable energy source, powered from the UK’s own freely available natural resources."
For its scope of work at Gwynt y Môr, the Friedrich Ernestine was fitted with the world’s largest reverse circulation pile top drill. The LDD500 was designed and built in the UK by Cornwall based LDD, who also provided a team to operate the drill offshore. The jackupe was built and is operated by RWE Innogy’s subsidiary RWE OLC GmbH.
The construction of Gwynt y Môr to date, has enabled the injection of over £350million into the UK supply chain, created and secured employment for over 2500 people in the UK, and is expected to sustain over 100 jobs long term through a new multi-million pound operations and maintenance base, which is being built at the Port of Mostyn in North Wales.
At the same time, North Wales Communities have been consulted on how to most usefully invest over £19million in community funding over the wind farm's working lifetime. This is in addition to a £690,000 tourism fund.
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