The Dutch government announced that construction has been completed of the first large offshore “socket”, or substation, that will connect 700 MW of energy from wind turbines in the North Sea to the mainland.
Borssele Alpha, TenneT’s first and at the same time largest connection system for wind farms on the Dutch North Sea is ready for operation.
Exactly to schedule and within budget, in 2020 Borssele Alpha will unlock the green energy from offshore wind farms Borssele I and II being built by the Danish energy company Ørsted.
Certification issued by DNV GL marked the completion of the Borssele Alpha project. It means that this offshore grid connection complies fully with the conditions set out in the Dutch government’s Offshore Wind Energy Development Framework.
The Borssele I and II wind farms will have a capacity of around 700 megawatts (MW). This corresponds to electricity generation for approximately one million households.
The power will be connected through TenneT’s offshore connection Borssele Alpha to the onshore high voltage substation near Borssele for further transport in the high-voltage grid. For this purpose, a new substation has been built next to the existing 380 kV Borssele high voltage substation.
According to the Energy Agreement, by the end of 2023 TenneT will have constructed 3,500 MW of offshore grid connections for offshore wind farms. The next offshore connection after Borssele Alpha is Borssele Beta.
Like Borssele Alpha, this connection system will have a capacity of 700 MW and will be completed in 2020, serving the Borssele III and Borssele IV wind farms, which are being developed by the Blauwwind consortium. After this, it will be the turn to ‘Hollandse Kust (zuid)’ Alpha and Beta, followed by ‘Hollandse Kust (noord)’.
TenneT will connect the wind farms off the coast of Zeeland, Zuid-Holland and Noord-Holland in the same way. Five times over, TenneT will use the same 700 MW transformer platforms that are located close to the wind farms, and the same type of cable connection to the coast. This standardization will allow these projects to be completed more efficiently, more quickly and more economically.