The installation of transition pieces (TPs) at Scotland’s Moray West offshore wind farm is expected to start on or around 23 January. The TPs will be installed by DEME’s installation vessel Apollo and the company’s vessel Orion will later also arrive at the site to undertake monopile installation.
Later this month, Apollo will start placing TPs on the monopiles, a batch of which has already been installed by Boskalis’s heavy lift installation vessel Bokalift 2 .
Orion will start MP installation on or around 5 February and will be performing this part of the work in addition to Bokalift 2 , which commenced monopile installation in October last year.
In December 2023, the vessel Bokalift 1 installed the first of the two offshore substation platforms (OSPs) at the Moray West offshore wind farm site.
Boskalis is installing monopiles under a contract the company secured in February 2023 , which involves a multidisciplinary role in the Scottish project, including the transport and installation of monopiles and the installation of the wind farm’s two substations.
DEME won the contract for the installation of monopile foundations and transition pieces at Moray West in 2022. The company’s scope of work also includes the bolting and grouting of the monopile/transition piece connections.
The 882 MW Moray West offshore wind farm, developed by Ocean Winds, is located in the Moray Firth, approximately 22.5 kilometres from the Caithness coastline.
The offshore wind farm will comprise 60 Siemens Gamesa 14.7 MW wind turbines and is scheduled to be fully operational in 2025. Once commissioned, Moray West is expected to meet the electricity requirements of about 650,000 households in Scotland for 25 years.