Siemens has received a further order for an offshore wind power plant in Scotland.
The company is to supply, install, and commission 84 wind turbines, each with a 154m rotor diameter designed to generate 7MW of power, for the "Beatrice" project.
Furthermore the scope of supply comprises the offshore grid connection to the mainland in consortium with Nexans, which will supply the connecting export cables.
Siemens will deliver the onshore and offshore substations consisting of two offshore transformer modules (OTM) which are smaller in weight and size. The customer, Beatrice Offshore Windfarm is a partnership formed between SSE (40%), Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (35%) and SDIC Power (25%).
The offshore wind power plant's capacity of 588MW will be sufficient to supply more than 400,000 UK households with ecofriendly electricity. Siemens will additionally be responsible for
"We are proud to announce the first reference for our newly developed Offshore Transformer Module together with our customer," stated Mirko Düsel, CEO Transmission Solutions Business Unit at Siemens. "The application of light weight distributed substations is an important lever for reaching Siemens' goal of reducing the costs of wind power generated offshore to below 10 euro cts/kWh by 2020."
The Beatrice offshore wind farm will be located around 14km off the Scottish coast. The SWT-7.0-154 wind turbines will be erected on jacket foundations in ocean depths between 35-56m. Siemens plans to produce the corresponding wind turbine blades for Beatrice at its Hull facility. Installation of the wind turbines is scheduled to begin in the summer of 2018.
Following commissioning of the plant in 2019, Siemens will also be responsible for service and maintenance for the wind turbines within the framework of a long-term service contract extending over a period of 15 years.
The contract also covers remote monitoring and diagnostics for the wind turbines so as to ensure their long-term availability and performance. The logistics concept for this plant also includes the use of a helicopter.
For the grid access solution, Siemens will deliver two offshore transformer modules , which are one third smaller in size and weight compared to a conventional alternating-current platform. Siemens' partner in delivering the offshore grid connection, Nexans, will be responsible for design, supply and installation of the export cable, both offshore and onshore.
The OTM's will be linked together to provide the required transmission capacity. Focusing on the core electrical equipment and removing a number of optional ancillary systems made this space and weight reduction possible, which also results in a reduced maintenance regime. The grid access solution will be project managed and engineered from the Siemens Energy Management Renewable Energy Engineering Centre in Manchester, UK.
Image: Offshore transformer module/Siemens
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