First Steel Cut for Thor Offshore Substation

Offshore Platforms

December 12, 2023, by Adnan Durakovic

HSM Offshore Energy has held a steel-cutting ceremony for the Thor Offshore High Voltage Station (OHVS) at its yard in Schiedam, the Netherlands.

RWE, the owner and developer of the 1 GW Thor offshore wind farm in the Danish North Sea, selected HSM Offshore Energy and its key subcontractors, Iv-Offshore & Energy and GE Renewable Energy, for the engineering, procurement, construction, installation, and commissioning of the offshore high voltage substation and its jacket foundation in 2022.

The open design of the substation, which will have a capacity of more than 1,000 megawatts (MW) and overall weight below 3000MT is said to be ”a gamechanger in the offshore wind market, offering best AC power / weight ratio in the history.”

According to HSM Offshore Energy, this reduces the use of structural steel and the energy needed during manufacturing – with steel sourcing and fabrication in Europe.

Both structures, the offshore substation and the jacket, will be built at HSM Offshore Energy’s yard in Scheidam.

RWE will build the THOR wind farm off the Danish west coast – approximately 22 kilometres from Thorsminde on the west coast of Jutland.

To connect the wind farm to the Danish grid, RWE will build two new substations – one at sea and one on land.

Once fully commissioned in 2027, the 1 GW project will become Denmark’s largest offshore wind farm and will be capable of producing enough green electricity to supply the equivalent of more than one million Danish households.